1 sided boards are difficult and cheap but watch out!

tooling is higher for making of a punch.
You generally need to deal with overseas vendors to get pricing down.
Asia has very good pricing now but getting higher.
there is no reason to combine drills since the tooling charge is fixed.
the lack of a plated thru barrel makes the assembly less rugged.
generally the pads are as large as possible.
you must assemble the board with the parts firmly clinched against the board
or fail the drop test.
drop tests results in cracked traces if not designed and assembled right.
the life-cycle based costs are higher due to field failures.
they cost more to design since jumpers are needed and it's a complex puzzle.
the expensive (one-time tool) wears out.
Best to go to asia to get good pricing.
the manufacuturing material costs are lower, other costs are higher.

I avoid single sided unless the customer has significant volumes and unit
prices are number one.

They are extremely hard to design and predict the design costs in a fixed
bid quote.
This is not an area to get involved in unless you have alot of experience
and know-how in design and  vendor negotiation.

Beware the many pitfalls.
Single sided pcb seem to be low tech and cheap but watch out.

Asia is getting very good pricing on 2 sided pcb's today which are a better
product if you can afford more unit cost.


-----Original Message-----
From: DesignerCouncil [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Jim
Mathis
Sent: Tuesday, November 16, 1999 6:34 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [DC] 1-layer vs 2-layer costing


Given the same size, # of holes, and circuitry, what is the typical
cost-adder for going from single-sided to double-sided PCBs?  1.5X, 2X, 3X,
etc?  The obvious cost-adders are the second copper layer, solder-mask, and
the hole-plating operation.

Thanks in advance for any input.
Jim Mathis, Radio Sound PCB Engineer