How Electronic Components Are Inspected To Ensure Quality?

Quality of all the electronic component is very important. No one can afford a bad quality product therefore each product has to pass through certain inspection techniques to ensure that they are of the best quality. Moreover, all the electrical parts are tested by a certified laboratory and they are required to meet their specific standards.
Some of the inspection/ examination techniques include-

Visual inspection-In this technique, material analysis is performed to ensure that the product is RoHs compliant. Furthermore, mechanical inspection is also done under this. In this technique, every component is viewed under a high-powered microscope to check whether there are certain non- conformities or not. The technician do their best to find out if there are signs of counterfeiting that may include incorrect color, mistakes in dates, codes and spellings, no proper font or marking and so on.  In addition, they also ensure that the product has not been used before or stored separately.

Microscopy inspection- During this technique, high resolution microscopes fitted with a digital camera are used for the inspection purpose. These microscopes are used to check different conditions such as flux, bent or damaged leads, excess solder, laser burns, ghost markings, paint splatter etc.

XRF RoHS- The XRF RoHS analysis is used for the testing of hazardous substance compliance. The analyzer uses X-Ray fluorescence to determine any damage in scanned component’s lead material. Furthermore, for defense related applications, it is important to establish the non-RoHS components.

X-ray imaging-This is one of the common inspection techniques that is used for all the electronic components. While some products are easily detected through visual inspection but there are still some problems for which X-ray technique is considered better. X-ray machines are basically designed to look inside the electronic components such as IC’s, resistors, hybrids etc to detect faults and fix them. This technique is used to provide the internal view of the product without destroying other parts.  However, the equipment used for this technique is quite expensive and requires experts to use it.

Heated solvents- Heated solvents are used to determine whether the parts from top are black or not and if there is any sanding underneath.

Decapsulation- It is a testing process that is used to depict the die of the circuit for inspection and verification. Decapsulation is used to reinforce the authenticity of the product.

All of the aforementioned are the main inspection techniques. Furthermore, apart from these techniques, make sure you buy a component from reliable electronic component distributors.