Another JLCPCB factory tour

[mikeselectricstuff]

https://youtu.be/jTBOSob5MLg

[thm_w]

damn Ferenac is always super thorough, 1hr 10mins total length.

52:26 doesnt fully show but it does show them routing outside of stacked boards with no vacuum or hold down that I see (just at the outer edge).
1:05:22 the notorious wireless ESD strap makes an appearance.

[schmitt trigger]

The Chinese board houses have the prototype-to-small-run business completely figured out.

And no, it is not only the low cost labor. If this was true, Cameroon would be a manufacturing power house.

[ataradov]

52:26 doesnt fully show but it does show them routing outside of stacked boards with no vacuum or hold down that I see (just at the outer edge).

I think it is a vacuum table. You can see him struggle to align that base spoil board and he had to peel it to re-align a bit.

1:05:22 the notorious wireless ESD strap makes an appearance.

This looks like a body voltage monitor similar to StatIQ that Dave checked out some time ago.

[thm_w]

1:05:22 the notorious wireless ESD strap makes an appearance.

This looks like a body voltage monitor similar to StatIQ that Dave checked out some time ago.

No just a cheap wireless strap. There is no chance they'd spend $2k+ on monitors for each employee.

[ataradov]

Ok, yeah, I was looking at the small embedded window and assumed that the bright opening was that fancy gold flux capacitor.

I had hope that it is something similar, but at a reasonable price point. I absolutely did not expect them to buy the actual $2K bands.

[EEVblog]

1:05:22 the notorious wireless ESD strap makes an appearance.

This looks like a body voltage monitor similar to StatIQ that Dave checked out some time ago.

No just a cheap wireless strap. There is no chance they'd spend $2k+ on monitors for each employee.

LCSC (aren't they the same company as JLC PCB?) also used these fake "wireless ESD band" and I called them out on it. They replied and said they were embarrassed and would fix the situtation. I didn't follow up on that though.

[thm_w]

Yeah thats the notoriety, from your video.

LCSC hasn't posted any youtube videos for four years: https://www.youtube.com/@LCSCElectronics/videos
The last videos show some employees using the wireless strap and some using nothing. I doubt they've "fixed" the issue by using proper ESD straps or monitors, it would just be too much of a hassle for them to do that. If you look at Mouser, this guy has some weird wrist straps but seems unrelated to ESD (1:35). Probably just proper shoes and flooring is enough in most cases.
https://youtu.be/FDCS9qSLVpY?t=94

In terms of JLC, I wouldn't trust them to assemble a high end PCBs. With any decent PCB assembler, they'd have staff clipped in at the benches.