Electronic devices have taken a prominent part of our lives. With this fact in mind, the extensive range of devices from cell-phones to servers, irrespective of their sizes and uses are now being designed to be flexible, lightweight and efficient. While they all come in diverse shapes, sizes and functionalities, there is one thing in common in many of them – they are built with flexible PCBs.
What is flexible PCB?
A flexible PCB (Printed circuit board) can have either of polyester, polyimide, polyethylene napthalate, or micro millimeter-sized thin metal foil as its base substrate. It can be one among single-sided, dual access, multi layered, or double-sided flex circuit varieties.
The range is vast and the benefits are many. Let's have a look at them.
The many benefits of a flex PCB
There are numerous benefits of using a flexible PCB.
1. The one most prominent is its inherent flexibility. The elastic nature of the flex boards makes them useful to be implemented on the areas around edges and folds of a device.
2. The flexible nature of the flex circuit boards helps them to be used in tightly assembled electronic configurations requiring connections to be set in 3 axes. This feature stands in contrast to all those rigid circuit boards that require huge space for connectivity.
3. Flexible PCBs come with little or no wiring thus reducing chances of wire clutter and unnecessary wastage of energy due to faulty wiring. Reduced wire connections in an electrical device make it less complicated and easy to be rectified in case of faults.
4. The resultant weightlessness also helps devices made with flex boards to be portable and more efficient.
5. Availability of track routing, in place of hand-built wire harness, nullifies any chance of wiring error to creep in.
6. SMT or Surface Mount Technology helps flexible PCBs to result in smooth interconnectivity between electrical components mounted on top of the circuitry thus making devices more reliable too.
7. They are made with flat conductors, thus heat generating during the operation gets easily dissipated. The thin dielectric base also provides an easy thermal path.
8. Last but not the least, the flexibility of flex PCBs helps in rendering stylish and compact appearance to an electronic appliance. The reduced assembly price results in overall lessening in the cost of a flexible PCB-equipped device.
All in all, these Flex PCBs help us to enjoy the service of modern electronic components that are compact in size, smooth and efficient in functions, and competitive in cost. Isn’t it all we want each of our devices to be: easy to keep and easy to carry?
