How many types of FPC reinforcement are there?

Have you ever faced the problem of how to select appropriate reinforcement for flexible circuit boards? Do you know how many kinds of reinforcements are available for flexible circuit boards? Do you know why you need to add reinforcement on FPC? The advantages and disadvantages of FPC reinforcement are that PI tolerance is small but not very hard, FR4’s thicker thinking choice tolerance is larger, and the steel sheet is hard and stable, and it is not easy to rework after manual assembly. Today, let’s study different types of reinforcement of flexible circuit boards.

We usually only use 3 types of FPC reinforcement. PI polyimide, FR4 and steel sheet.

1. PI reinforcement: the tolerance can be controlled within+/- 0.03mm, with high precision and high temperature resistance (130-280 ℃)
2. Steel sheet reinforcement: manual assembly is required, which makes the process more complex and costs more.
3. FR4 reinforcement: if the thickness is less than 0.1mm, the tolerance can be controlled within+/- 0.05mm. If the thickness is greater than 1.0mm, the tolerance is+/- 0.1mm

FPC reinforcement thickness

1. PI reinforcement thickness: 0.075mm, 0.1mm, 0.125mm, 0.15mm, 0.175mm, 0.2mm, 0.225mm, 0.25mm
2. FR4 reinforcement thickness: 0.1mm, 0.2mm, 0.3mm, 0.4mm, 0.5mm, 0.6mm, 0.7mm, 1.6mm
3. Steel sheet reinforcement thickness: 0.1mm, 0.2mm