[sdiy] SMT vs. THrough Hole....

[James Patchell]

I can only offer opinions, I don't really have any facts.  Generally with 
surface mount assembly, though, you would farm that out.  There are several 
good houses out there, I can even give you the name of one in Santa 
Paula.  I think even at quantity 75, surface mount will end up being less 
expensive than trough hole.

Reliability should, in theory, be better with surface mount.

And as you know, repairability is close to zip, but, it can be done.

Some components can only be had in surface mount.

Trouble is, if you are using a part that is only available as through hole, 
I believe the CA3280 is a good example, you then have to worry about costs 
again.

I would tend to discount the gee-whiz factor.

At 05:24 PM 6/26/2004 -0700, Peter Grenader wrote:
>Can anyone share data which would indicate, on a SMALL QUANTITY
>manufacturing cycle on a given product (let's say 75 of something within a
>year period), that SMT would be either more reliable, less expensive and
>more servicable over than  through hole product all things considered?
>
>We're talking quantities that would not require the use of pick and place
>automated assembly machines.
>
>Looking at out of warranty service issues, repairability, troubleshooting,
>cost of hand assembly vs. that of through hole manual assembly etc - it
>would seem to me that if a manufacturer didn't have the luxury of automated
>assembly and simply replacing a bad board with a good one, that
>troubleshooting and repair would much more of an ordeal than if the circuit
>was through hole.  I'm taking into consideration here the ease of id'ing
>mislocated parts (via color codes), the relative ease of component
>replacement, (especially with IC sockets), etc.
>
>There is a gee-whiz factor, and yeah, there is something to be said about
>that.  But at what cost does that come?
>
>anyone?
>anyone?
>
>- Peter

         -Jim
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