Julie: "Standard" acid Cu plating baths will deposit 1 mil of Cu in 1100-1200 amp minutes. If you plate at a current density of 25 amps per square foot(ASF), it will take about 45 minutes. This current density should give you satisfactory distribution across the panel and through the holes for moderate to low difficulty boards. A word of caution, this is an average deposit thickness. If you are trying to plate a minimum of 1 mil of Cu there will be areas on the board that will be less. If you set 1500 amp minutes as the target that will give you an average of 1.3 mils and keep you from under plating the board. If you plate at 25 ASF that equates to 60 minutes. On boards of higher difficulty keep the amp minutes constant i.e. 1500 and lower the current density from 25ASF to a 17-22ASF range. Again the amount of time is simply the amp minutes divided by the current density. The higher the current density(ASF)the shorter the plating time and vice versa. There's a lot more to it than just this but it should give you a starting point. Regards Michael Barmuta Staff Engineer Fluke Corp. Everett Wa. 425-356-6076 -----Original Message----- From: Julie Dixon [mailto:[log in to unmask]] Sent: Thursday, October 07, 1999 12:13 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [TN] plating times for pcb's Dear Technet, For a small shop without automation or ppr, what is a standard time acceptable to plate moderate to low difficulty double- sided boards to 1 mil with a standard acid copper plating solution? Our vendor can offer us a different brightner system, etc., I was just looking for a norm. We can make adjustments to speed our cycles, but we give up even distribution. Thanks, Green ############################################################## TechNet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ############################################################## To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TECHNET <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TECHNET ############################################################## Please visit IPC web site (http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm) for additional information. If you need assistance - contact Gayatri Sardeshpande at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5365 ############################################################## ############################################################## TechNet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ############################################################## To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TECHNET <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TECHNET ############################################################## Please visit IPC web site (http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm) for additional information. If you need assistance - contact Gayatri Sardeshpande at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5365 ##############################################################