Your One-Stop Hard Gold PCB Manufacturer in China

Your Reliable Hard Gold PCB Supplier

PCBMay is a professional PCB supplier in China. We offer a wide range of PCBs widely used in intelligent industrial equipment, entertainment, intelligent AI, education robots, and more.

The PCBMay hard gold circuit board, also known as hard electrolytic gold, has a solid and durable surface. It provides extended shelf life and excellent performance. If you are looking for a highly durable board for high-wear applications, the PCBMay is your best choice.

PCBMay manufactures a hard gold PCB composed of a gold layer with added hardeners to increase durability. Another, using an electrolytic process, the board is plated with hard gold. During fabrication, the hard gold circuit board also needs to be put with solder effectively.

Depending on your PCB design, we will consider other fabrication processes to ensure functionality and reliability. PCBMay comes with many competitive advantages over different PCBs.

All PCBMay hard gold printed circuit boards are ISO-compliant, RoHS-certified, and UL-listed. We offer a comprehensive selection of products available in multiple types and specifications. At PCBMay, we will support your project demand with our meticulous PCB quality management standards.

To maximize efficiency, you can send us your hard gold PCB drawing early to collaborate with our design and development team.

PCBMay is capable of providing a one-stop solution for your product development. Being an expert manufacturer, we offer a high on-time rate and urgent delivery on your orders. We will help you maximize your opportunity to rocket your business in the market.

We are a professional hard gold PCB manufacturer with more than ten years of experience. We will provide a fast prototype service. In just 24-48 working hours of production time, your orders will be on their way to your place.

As an experienced company, we have a strong sense of service, from sketch to production. We can provide you with quality PCB solutions according to your specific needs and situation.

If you are interested in our hard gold PCB capabilities, you can contact us over email at sales@pcbmay.com or toll-free at +86-755-23196857.

Hard Gold PCB: The Ultimate FAQ Guide

In electric circuit design, PCB connections are always critical.

Hard gold PCB brings out a unique solution to this problem.  This multi-effective PCB allows the repetitive installation and removal of PCBs in complex applications. It is used in ensuring a smooth connection of the edge.

Numerous benefits of a Hard gold circuit board enhance its implementation to a large extent. Are you aware of this reliable PCB solution? If it is negative, we are here for you. PCBMay is the most worthwhile manufacturer of Hard gold PCBs.

This FAQ guide will let you know the ins and outs of Hard gold PCB. So, let’s make a move.

What Is A Hard Gold PCB?

It is an amalgamation of gold and other metals like nickel, cobalt, iron, etc. this is a unique type of PCB where a layer of gold is applied to the nickel layer. It uses electroplating to deposit gold on nickel. It is different from others in terms of its hardness and friction-resistive nature.

The hard gold printed circuit board surface has a bright appearance. It is useful to render contact points on PCB surfaces. Again, hard gold PCB has a reputation for establishing edge connections.

Its other name is electroplated nickel-gold.

Hard Gold PCB

Here, the nickel layer acts as a barrier between the copper surface and gold. If these two have an uninterrupted connection, it causes diffusion. This is not good for the hard gold board. That’s why a nickel layer is added here in the middle of them.

Despite having some limitations, the applications of hard gold PCB are increasing day by day.

What Are The Properties Of Hard Gold PCB?

The most significant properties of hard gold PCB are-

• Electrolytic deposition of gold on nickel
• More than two thermal cycles
• Shelf life is more than a year
• Fair process controlling
• Flat surface mount technology
• Certified by RoHS
• Compatible with normal handling
• Thin PCB surface finish
• 98% pure 23-carat gold
• The thickness of gold is around 30 to 50 microinches
• The nickel layer is around 100 to 150 micro inches thick.

Hard Gold PCB Properties

What Are The Applications Of Hard Gold PCB?

It is used in various applications. Its tremendous benefits permit you to apply it to so many different electronic devices.

Widely Used Hard Gold PCB

Some of its notable applications are-

• Fine pitch surface mount technology
• Small batch PCB productions like ball grid array and micro ball grid array.
• Flip chips
• PCB edge-connectors
• Artificial intelligence
• Robotics
• Joined career boards
• PCB gold finger
• Keypad
• Industrial equipment where useful wear resistance is required

What Are The Benefits Of Hard Gold PCB?

It solves many critical issues of complicated electric circuits. Its numerous advantages turn it into the most reliable coating process of today.

The notable benefits of hard gold PCB are explained here to render you a better idea.

High Functionality

It provides supreme functionality in electric devices. It ensures the smooth conduction of electrons which enhances the efficiency of high-density circuits. The flatness of hard gold PCB pads allows more features on the PCB surface.

Hard gold board renders the required contact points while plug-in or eliminating PCBs often. Besides, it promotes the edge joints. It also increases the solderability of the PCB surface.

This hard gold-plated PCB is compatible with low-volume production like BGA (ball grid array) or um BGA. Again, this is highly applicable in SMT(surface mount technology). That’s why hard gold PCB is a highly functional circuit solution nowadays.

Durability

It is extremely durable. Its moisture absorption rate is very low. Again, the high thermal resistance of hard gold PCB promotes its durability. The hard gold coating is useful to the thin PCB surface finishes.

Highly Functional Hard Gold PCB

Long shelf life

The shelf life of a hard gold board is one year. This is long compared to other PCB surface coating methods. The long service life of hard gold PCB makes it worthwhile for versatile projects.

Corrosion resistive

It delivers high resistance against the corrosion of the PCB surface. Here, a gold layer is used on the nickel layer. So a polished gold covering resists the decay of copper surface efficiently. It also prevents oxidation in hard gold PCB.

Nature Friendly

There is no adverse effect on the environment due to the use of hard gold PCB. This is lead-free. So, It has RoHS compliance. The hard gold board provides higher reliability to electric devices because of its tremendous benefits.

Is Hard Gold PCB Plating Better Than ENIG Plating?

When you think about gold plating applications, hard gold PCB and ENIG PCB are two prominent options. But, which one is better between these two?

It offers some outstanding advantages compared to ENIG in some cases. Let’s have a look at some aspects.

Contact Force Absorption

It is harder than ENIG. So, it is more effective than ENIG against the contact force.

Resistance To Wear

It provides high wear resistance compared to ENIG. It is more applicable in projects where the wear sliding repetition is necessary.

Easy Processing

It uses an electroplating process. But, ENIG uses the electroless method. Electroplating is easier than the electroless process from some angles.

ENIG PCB

Appearance

The appearance of hard gold PCB is better than ENIG. The visible interconnect projects require smooth gold contacts. That’s why a hard gold circuit board is more applicable in that case.

Black Pad

A black pad or nickel pad is found in the ENIG PCB surface finish. But, it is free from the black pad. This property makes hard gold PCB more effective.

Cost

ENIG is more expensive than hard gold PCB. So, hard gold-plated PCB is preferable to ENIG. ENIG is also not reworkable. This ability to rework is highly beneficial to hard gold PCB.

Signal Loss

It never faces any significant signal loss in its shelf life. But, ENIG provides notable loss of the signals during data transmission.

Functionality

ENIG PCB renders less functionality in some cases. Such as, it is not compatible with the contact pads.

Shelf Life

It has a long shelf life of more than one year. ENIG also lasts a long time.

So, you can understand that hard gold PCB is preferable to ENIG in these aspects. But, ENIG delivers better performance in resisting corrosion, solderability, etc. That’s why you should make the right choice concerning your requirements.

What Is The Best Thickness Of Hard Gold PCB?

It provides immense benefits for edge connection. A proper dimension of hard gold PCB will give you the maximum result of using it.

Hard Gold PCB With The Best Thickness

Here, the gold which is electroplated on the nickel layer is 98% pure and 23 karat. The ideal thickness of hard gold is around 30 to 50um. The nickel layer is around 100 to 150 um. You should maintain this range for thickness while designing hard gold PCB.

Know about PCB design

What Is The Shelf Life Of A Hard Gold PCB?

Shelf life indicates the time length for which a PCB is usable. Hard gold PCB provides its service for a long time. Its typical shelf life is more than one year. This long service life gives it the benefit of high-volume productions.

Hard Gold PCB Of Long Shelf Life

Hard gold PCB is also widely used due to its long shelf life.

What Is The Dielectric Strength Of Hard Gold PCB?

Dielectric strength is the measurement of required electric potential with respect to the thickness that causes dielectric breakdown. This breakdown indicates a decrease in insulating properties.  The higher dielectric strength provides higher insulation in hard gold PCB materials.

In the case of hard gold PCB, dielectric strength is influenced by temperature, moisture, high frequency, etc. Insulating properties are crucial for impeding the overflow of electrons in electric circuits. It causes overheating and damage to the hard gold PCB surface.

Hard Gold PCB With High Dielectric Strength

A proper dielectric strength offers the required electric field intensity to resist the move from the insulation band to the conduction band. But, this system breaks down at a certain voltage. Then it compromises the performance.

It enhances the dissipation factor of hard gold circuit board materials. That means it lacks functionality and durability significantly. So, you must keep your input voltage lower than the breakdown voltage of a hard gold PCB.

What Is The Cost Of A Hard Gold PCB?

It is highly cost-effective. You need to pay up to $10 for one piece of hard gold PCB. But, this price will rise in the case of multilayer PCB stack-up with hard gold PCB.

Cost-Effective Hard Gold PCB

So, you have to choose your required hard gold board at an affordable rate. Contact us. We provide low-cost hard gold PCBs.

What Are The Comparisons Between Hard Gold PCB And Soft Gold PCB?

Hard gold and soft gold platings are two types of electroplated gold plating technology. There are some distinguishing factors between them. Here is a comparative analysis for your convenience.

• It is an alloy of gold with nickel. This gold is 98% pure. But, soft gold is free from any other metals.
• Hard gold-plated PCB is harder than soft gold PCB. That’s why it provides better absorption of contact force.
• It is more wire resistant than soft gold PCB.
• It has a brighter look compared to soft gold PCB.
• The edge-connection ability of hard gold PCB is more effective.
• Soft gold is more corrosion-resistant than hard gold.
• It is less solderable.

Soft Gold PCB

So, hard gold PCB renders better performance in electric circuits than soft gold plating.

How Can You Choose The Best Hard Gold PCB?

You can choose the best hard gold PCB easily if you consider some crucial factors. Like,

• RoHS certification
• Affordable price
• Long shelf life
• Proper thickness
• Higher thermal cycle
• High dielectric strength
• High solderability
• Better wear resistance

The Best Hard Gold PCB

These factors will give you a proper idea about the best hard gold PCB.

Why Should You Consider Temperature Change For Hard Gold PCB?

It can not deliver maximum output if the temperature changes frequently. So,  you have to think about maintaining a constant temperature in hard gold PCB applications.

Temperature affects the materials of PCB considerably. High temperature increases the movement of polar molecules resulting in variable dielectric constants. The hard gold board lacks efficiency due to the rapid change of the dielectric constant. It also promotes the loss of tangent of hard gold PCB.

Thermal Resistive Hard Gold PCB

Besides, change in temperature is not effective for maintaining the thermal resistance of hard gold PCB materials. So, the entire integrity of signal processing will be hampered to a great extent.

In the increased temperature, the solderability of hard gold PCB is affected. Since gold and nickel both are thermally conductive metals, it is difficult to ensure a proper layering of gold.

All of these matters indicate that you need to maintain consistency in the case of temperature. This will promote the performance of hard gold PCB.

What Is The Ul 94 Standard Rating Of Hard Gold PCB?

UL 94 standard indicates the flammability of plastic elements in a device. Hard gold PCB has UL  94 V-0 rating. That means

• The burning will come to an end within 10 sec.
• Drips of particles are allowed.

UL 94 Standards

Do You Need Electroplating For Hard Gold PCB?

Of course. You have to electroplate hard gold(lesser purity) over the nickel layer in the case of hard gold PCB. That’s why it is also named the electroplated nickel-gold PCB.

Unlike electroless plating, electricity is used to coat a metal on another metal during electroplating. This is required because direct contact between copper and gold causes some problems like diffusion and displacement of electrons, etc.

Electroplated Hard Gold PCB

So, a nickel layer is applied between them. This gold plating in hard gold PCB lasts for a long time. Electroplating delivers a sufficient current supply that ensures a solid and resistant gold covering on the surface of the nickel. Sometimes you may need to apply the electroplating process multiple times to get the required thickness.

How Can You Choose The Right Via For Hard Gold PCB?

Via is an important factor of multilayer PCB. Since hard gold PCB can be used in multilayer PCB stackup, it affects the performance of hard gold PCB. Via is a hole on the PCB pad. It is used as a channel for current and heat through different layers of PCB.

Hard Gold PCB vias

There are mainly three types of vias in PCB.

• Through-hole vias
• Buried vias
• Blind vias

You need to consider the contact force absorption and wear resistance properties of hard gold PCB to choose the right via. Plated through-hole vias are not applicable in hard gold PCBs. These vias hamper the mechanism of hard gold PCB. Buried vias connect two internal layers. But blind vias are used to join an internal layer with the external layer.

Blind and buried vias are useful to hard old PCBs. These two don’t lessen the resistance to wear.

What Are The Required Considerations Before Hard Gold PCB Design?

It demands a well-designed fabrication to maintain superior quality. That’s why you should consider some crucial rules during its design.

Such as:

• Its features should be placed from the external edge at sufficient depth (around 25 mm).
• The hard gold plated region must be free from PTH(plated through holes), solder mask, silk screening, etc.
• PCB gold fingers need to be adjusted with a conductor trace of 0.008”.
• Gold fingers should be placed by facing outward from the center of the hard gold panel.
• The proper measurements should be maintained accurately.
• The exact amount of hard gold should be applied. You can easily calculate the gold requirement. You just need to measure the dimensions of the hard gold PCB surface. Then, identify the weight easily.
• Thermal resistivity, and soldering capability should be considered.

Hard Gold PCB Design

A proper design of PCB will ensure the ultimate functionality of PCB-driven applications. Contact us. We offer experienced manufacturing that relaxes you about designing hard gold PCBs.

How Can You Etch A Hard Gold PCB?

Etching means the removal of avoidable materials from the PCB surfaces. Usually, a chemical solution with a known concentration is used to etch PCB. This process promotes the entire effectiveness of hard gold PCB.

The etching of a hard gold printed circuit board should be performed carefully. The first thing required is to cover the required portion of hard gold PCB. Then just submerge the PCB laminate in standard ferric chloride solution. This solution ensures flawless etching.

Hard Gold-Plated PCB

It reacts with the materials in the bare portion of the PCB surface. If the space between components of hard gold PCB is large, it will take more time to etch. You have to be conscious of etching undercut. This phenomenon causes flaking in the hard gold circuit boards.

Besides, the gold coating on the nickel layer should be kept intact during etching. Otherwise, it will not provide you with the desired result.

PCB etching

What Are The Limitations Of Hard Gold PCB?

It renders numerous tremendous advantages in versatile applications efficiently. Despite these, it has some limitations which you should consider seriously.

• Its processing requires extra labor
• Hard gold plating in PCB is a little bit costly way
• The maximum solderable thickness of hard gold PCB is 17.8um. That’s why it is unable to provide sufficient solderability in some cases.
• It is less effective for wire bonding.

Effective Hard Gold PCB

But, all of these drawbacks can be minimized by choosing the right manufacturer of hard gold PCB. Its immense benefits justify the apparent high cost.

How Can You Verify The Performance Of Hard Gold PCB?

There are multiple testing methods available to verify the performance of hard gold PCB. Here, we are explaining three common and trustworthy tests method.

Flying Probe Test

The mechanism of the flying probe test is less complicated. Here, you have relief from using additional fixtures. You just need to put a couple of probes on the final points of various lines in succession.

Hard Gold PCB Flying Probe Test

This test offers a low cost to the customers due to its simple operation. But, it consumes a lot of time to check all terminal points. The flying probe test is highly applicable in hard gold PCB with higher density.

But, in the case of high-volume production, you have to think about time.

Universal Grid Test

This test is conducted through ATE(Automatic Testing Equipment). The grid test is applicable for the off-grid design of high-density hard gold PCB projects. It consists of a fixed grid with a huge needle plate. These plates are designed concerning the different portions of hard gold printed circuit board.

Here, the movable probes, located in the needle plates can only penetrate the specific holes of hard gold PCB. These holes are covered with a mask made of G10 materials. You need to supply around 250V electric potentials to conduct a smooth grid test.

Automated Optical Inspection(AOI) Test

This is a completely automated way to verify a hard gold PCB. In this case, 2D or 3D images of your PCB are compared with the ideal images of hard gold PCBs. The AOI algorithm applies the pixel-count method to match the template of the PCB.

AOI test offers you reliability, low cost, multiple inspection facilities, etc. This test also takes less time than other tests.

How Can You Choose The Best Manufacturer Of Hard Gold PCB?

It promotes the performance of your projects. But, you need to choose the best manufacturer of hard gold PCB to get the maximum benefit of it.

You should keep some factors in mind before making your choice. Such as:

• A long-term hard gold PCB manufacturing experience
• Adequate storage of useful raw materials
• Well-equipped professional team
• 7/24 hours of customer service with assembly and fabrication support
• Smooth performance testing facility
• Huge production capacity of ISO-certified hard gold board with IPC class 2 or class 3 quality.

PCBMay is the leading manufacturer of hard gold PCBs nowadays. We have been providing PCB manufacturing service for more than 15 years with great reliability. So, contact us to experience the most effective PCB of IPC Class 2 standard.

Conclusion

Hard gold PCB has brought out revolutionary effectiveness in the case of circuit designing. Now, using a Hard gold board is the most effective way to prevent edge problems. You have the flexibility of frequent use of PCBs through hard gold plating.

PCBMay offers you the optimum experience of PCB. In this FAQ guide, we have tried to explain almost every detail of a Hard gold circuit board in the easiest way. We hope this will bring you peace of mind. For any further queries, contact us.