Electronic Design Process FAQ’s
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) Whilst customers are always welcome to utilise our telephone and e-mail technical support, answers to the most common queries we deal with can be found below and may vastly expedite the resolution to what could well be a very common ‘issue’.
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Step 1 – Requirements Definition
- Does my requirements definition need to be a formal document?
- No – we can help you regardless of how you’ve defined your requirement.
- Can DSL help me to produce a requirements definition?
- Yes – we can work with you to help define your requirements
- What areas should I be covering in creating my requirements definition?
- In short, you should focus on defining your functional (what functions you need it to perform) and environmental (what environment will it operate in, both in terms of what it interfaces with and the local conditions it will operate in)
- Does my requirements definition need to be a formal document?
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Step 2 – Design Proposal (Outline)
- What should I expect to see in my Design Proposal?
- Your Design Proposal will document our complete understanding of every aspect of your requirement and at top level define our proposed solution.
- Is there a charge for producing a Design Proposal?
- No, we do not charge our clients for the creation of this document necessary for us to provide a quotation.
- How long should I expect it to take to produce a Design Proposal?
- Depending upon design engineering loading and the quantity/complexity of unknowns, typically 1-2 weeks.
- What should I expect to see in my Design Proposal?
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Step 3 – Design Proposal (Costs/Time-scales)
- Will this contain unit costs or just design costs?
- If estimated unit costing is critical at the initial stages of your project, we can include these though it will take us longer to generate the quotation.
- Will these be accurate or estimated costs?
- The design costs will be accurately costed, unit pricing won’t be able to be determined accurately at this pre-design phase, so will be estimated
- Will the design costs be fixed or potentially expanding costs?
- All our design costs are fixed to reduce risk for our clients. If a circumstance were to occur where we overrun, this is our additional cost to bear, not the clients.
- Am I allowed to make changes to it mid-design? If so, how does that work?
- Of course, we understand requirements can change through market changes or specific requests from key clients. When you become aware of a need to change, let us know and we’ll produce an ECR (engineering change request) detailing the impact on development time and unit cost, for you to approve (or reject)
- Will this contain unit costs or just design costs?
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Step 4 - Project Plan
- What format will this be provided in?
- We can provide as a PDF for instant viewing or as a GANNT chart for importation into Microsoft Project and similar.
- Will this be updated to reflect actual progress?
- You will be re-issued with the Project Plan at each design step should there be any deviation from previously projected progress.
- What format will this be provided in?
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Step 5 – Design Specification
- How does this differ from the Design Proposal?
- The Design Proposal documents your requirement itself and our proposed solution. The Design Specification is a comprehensive specification of the solution we are producing against your requirements definition, written in easy to understand language that enables you to confirm the solution meets your every need. It is later used to validate the prototypes 100% marry with that specification.
- What should I expect to see in my Design Specification?
- You should expect to see every element of your design comprehensively detailed in easy to read sections often defining key component selections and functions.
- How does this differ from the Design Proposal?
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Step 6 - Schematic Design
- What are schematics?
- Simply, schematics are a map of how all the components used within your design connect to one another, via which pins.
- What format will they be provided in?
- We can provide as a PDF for instant viewing or a direct Altium® export, if you wish to review within a PCB package or online with just a browser.
- What level of validation am I expected to perform myself?
- We don’t expect our clients to be expert electronic engineers so are not looking for clients to validate our work, although you are of course welcome to! Schematics are provided to you as evidence of completion of this phase of the design.
- What are schematics?
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Step 7 - PCB Design
- What format will they be provided in?
- We can provide as a 3D PDF for instant viewing or a direct Altium® export, if you wish to review within a PCB packageor online with just a browser.
- What level of validation am I expected to perform myself?
- We don’t expect our clients to be expert electronic engineers so are not looking for clients to validate our work, although you are of course welcome to! PCB layout are provided to you as evidence of completion of this phase of the design, though many clients use this to verify mechanical compatibility with enclosures or a wider system.
- What format will they be provided in?
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Step 8 – Prototyping
- How many prototypes should I produce?
- Depending upon the size of the PCB, there is often a ‘sweet spot’ of how many prototypes to produce most cost-effectively that lies between 4 and 10. To reduce risk, we typically don’t recommend producing larger quantities.
- What should I budget for them to cost?
- It’s incredibly difficult to accurately cost prototypes before starting the design, due to so many variables being involved (size, complexity, components used, speed of manufacture) but as a guide, with a standard build speed, they typically cost around 3x the cost of 100 production units.
- Will there be NRE/tooling charges applicable?
- Yes, a separate charge to cover set up of machinery will usually apply, for the first build of a PCB and if any PCB changes have been made from the previous build.
- How many ‘sets’ of prototypes should I expect?
- This is largely dependent upon the conclusions of the testing phase of the first set of prototypes. Often improvements can only be identified during physical prototype testing, if this necessitates a modification to the PCB design we recommend validating these first on a smaller batch, either as a second prototype set or, if the changes are low risk, a pre-production run.
- How many prototypes should I produce?
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Step 9 - Environmental Testing
- What does this involve?
- Environmental testing is confirming the solutions suitability in the environment it has been designed to operate by replicating that environment. Typically this covers ambient temperature ranges and EMC testing to achieve UKCA/CE/FCC certification.
- Should I manage this myself or should DSL manage it for me?
- If your DSL design is just part of a larger system, it’ll be the larger system that is likely to require the testing so it may make sense to manage this yourself. If your DSL design is the entirety of the system, it may make sense for us to manage this on your behalf.
- What does this involve?
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Step 10 - Delivery of manufacturing pack
- What format will this be provided in?
- A ZIP file containing gerbers, bills of materials (BoM) and all other documentation pertinent to the design to enable it to be manufactured.
- Do I own the IP?
- Absolutely, you own the IP of the design and are free to have it manufactured wherever you wish, although of course we’d love to continue working with you through manufacture.
- What format will this be provided in?
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Step 11 - Production Management
- What benefit is there of DSL managing my production build?
- DSL have long term relationships with a number of PCBA manufacturers, all with specialities that can make them the optimum manufacturer dependant upon PCB complexity, quantity etc. DSL identify and arrange PCBA manufacture with the most suitable partner and perform any assembly and/or testing required in-house.
- DSL seamlessly manage those pesky availability and obsolescence issues that invariably arise through long term manufacture without needing to involve you such that you receive what you need, when you need it, every time.
- Can I request flexible delivery arrangements?
- Absolutely, our flexible stocking arrangements mean you can benefit from building a larger quantity to reduce unit pricing, but can receive them and only pay for them at the rate you actually need them, whether that’s split deliveries or an open call off arrangement.
- What benefit is there of DSL managing my production build?