[serious, no joke replies or guesses / autotranslation please]
do I know anyone native or otherwise very fluent in Chinese who can tell me the correct term for a plated edge connector, like you might find on a PCIe card? specifically the "gold fingers" style connector feature you would find on the PCB side, not the plastic connector it slots into.
I've had an absolute nightmare trying to communicate this feature to a Shenzhen-based PCB vendor and I would like it to be easier in future.
@gsuberland I often look at the English Wikipedia and then select link to another language there to find often the right terminology. However, this assumes that one knows the target language at least a bit.
@jornfranke yeah that'd be fine when I can infer some basic sentence structure and word similarity from common roots, but with a language that doesn't use Roman characters and has a completely different grammar it's very difficult. considering these designs often cost hundreds to produce, I want absolute confidence I've got the right term.
@gsuberland Out of interest, have you got something back from them that indicates they're misunderstanding?... and what is the issue at play? Confidence in communication?
Is it around specifing the hard-gold plating? (not the chamfer, as mentioned in your post below?)
I'm making a board that has an SFP-like edge connector. I knew they were gonna add rails to the design for assembly, so I said "please do not attach an assembly rail to the end of the plated edge connector on the left" in the order notes. they asked what I meant by that, so I sent them a diagram of the board, with annotations showing where it was and wasn't ok to attach rails to.
@attie they were still confused by this, so I explained again and sent them more diagrams and images of what I was talking about. I gave them an example of how the rails could be attached, showing a clearance area around the edge connector. they then asked if I was concerned this would interfere with component placement in that area during PCBA, which is when I realised they really weren't understanding what the edge connector feature was.
@attie and I should point out here that I'm also paying for PCBA so they literally have the files that show where parts are being placed, and I included 3D renders showing there aren't any parts there, so... yeah. frustrating. all of this made me realise that I was talking to non-technical frontline support folks and things were getting lost along the way.
@attie they sent me an example panel attachment where the rails were attached directly to the end of the edge connector (which is what I was saying they shouldn't do) so I edited it to show it being attached to the little side tabs instead, with a gap. they said they'd need to add "stamp holes" which I assumed meant via perforation at the attachment points, so I said "yeah I think that'll be ok".
... aaaaaand they sent back production files where it was directly attached, not as discussed.
@attie so I marked them "not approved" and attached a file with a diagram showing the problem with what they'd sent, and a corrected version that would be ok, which I think went directly to the engineers instead of via support, and finally they sent me back a board that looks correct.
@polpo searching that term only returns the mating connectors, not the actual plated edge feature, which suggests it probably isn't what I'm looking for.
@bert_hubert@gsuberland@bunnie I know a Chinese dude @ Intel who should be able to answer, but he's a quite interesting fellow who chooses to live without a car or internet at home (he goes to McDonalds on a bike to use the internet, but he's like literally a VP of a research dept these days)
@gsuberland is this a common feature? I know some native Chinese speakers I could send this to for you, but their chemists and as far as I know have never done PCB design so they might not know. but I can ask if you'd like.
@Canageek it's a common feature on PCBs, but people who haven't done PCB design likely won't know what it's called (just as most English speakers probably wouldn't know the term "gold fingers" is sometimes used to describe it)
there are some useful answers in the thread, though.
@gsuberland I found this page https://www.jlc.com/portal/server_guide_10579.html and doing an auto-translate back to English the title consists of "金手指斜边" "gold finger bevel" and "设计注意事项" "design considerations". I also found the prefix "金手指" of that on the Chinese language quote form of pcbway (jdbpcb) and selecting that makes a dropdown appear where you can select something with 20°, 30° or 45° (which are the exact edge connector bevelling options pcbway has for the English form).
@jix the tricky bit is that the edge chamfer isn't what I want to communicate, because often I'll have a plated edge connector feature without paying the extra cost adder for the chamfer.
@gsuberland Sorry, I was thinking that finding matching pcb quote forms is neither a guess nor an auto translate ... but I should have realized that it still wasn't at all what you were actually asking for
@gsuberland "hard gold edge fingers", which is gold over a layer of nickel, required to prevent the gold aroms from dispersing through the copper.
If you just say "gold edge fingers", you'll get "gold flash", an ultra-thin layer of gold without nickel, which will wear off after only a few mating cycles. Due to the previously mentioned dispersal, it can still look gold after that, while not actually providing the corrosion resistance of hard gold.
1/
@gsuberland PCIe spec says 0.7um (micron) gold over 1.2um nickel. This is IIRC enough to last for 50 mating cycles.
Be very careful about units, as PCB plating used to be commonly specified in uin (microinches), and sometimes still is. 1 microinch is only about 0.03 microns, so if you and the PCB company aren't using the same units, you can get screwed.
If you have to use microinches, the equivalent to the PCIe spec is (obviously) approximately 25 microinches gold over 40 microinches nickel.
2/
@brouhaha no no, I know what it is in English, I need to know the Chinese because they don't understand what I mean when I say "plated edge connector with gold fingers".
@gsuberland Even when they do know, you have to emphasize "hard gold" and plating thickness, or you'll get crap.
I've not personally encountered a Chinese PCB fab that didn't know what gold edge fingers were, but I've mostly used fabs that routinely deal with western customers.
Did you try sending them your photo?
@brouhaha I sent them many diagrams and photos over a five day period, repeatedly trying to make it clear what I was trying to say, and even saying "like you find on a PCIe card", with pictures and arrows and annotations. It took until today before they finally communicated the right details to the technical staff to get it right. It has been an absolute slog. I'm asking for the correct natively-understood Chinese word to avoid this hassle in future.
@gsuberland wanted to help, but my wife doesn't know (she's native). The only thing she could think of is 插口 (cha'kou) which literally means socket - and that's not what you're looking for.
the technical staff obviously know what a plated edge connector is just by looking at it, but vendors often staff their customer support teams with non-technical people who have a stronger standard of written English but a lesser understanding of PCB design, making it a game of telephone (this is possibly the only appropriate time to call it "Chinese whispers") where getting the correct information passed through to the people who produce the final design files can be extremely challenging.
I didn't think this needed saying but I'm asking for the name of this feature in Chinese. I know that it's a gold plated edge connector, sometimes referred to as "gold fingers". But I don't know what the correct word for that is in Chinese, which is the problem I'm having, because when I have said "gold plated edge connector" the support people at the PCB vendor have not correctly understood what I mean, despite this being the exact term used in their English language support articles.
And I'm specifically looking for the correct term for the feature as a whole, not the chamfered edge that is often added to it, which is a separate detail, or the mating connector. The reason I am asking for someone who is fluent to give me an answer is because "just look at vendor sites that have both English and Chinese versions and figure it out from there" doesn't offer me enough confidence that it's actually correctly describing the feature. "I guess that might be it" isn't good enough.
I spent five straight days trying to communicate this feature, and my requirements in relation to it, to a PCB vendor who makes PCBs all day every day. If that level of miscommunication occurs when I am absolutely confident in my usage of the English terminology, the situation isn't going to be helped by trying to communicate the same thing with a Chinese translation I have little to no confidence in. Hence me being very specific in asking for help from someone who really knows the language.
So if I get grumpy or short with you for responding with a guess or autotranslation when I explicitly asked people who are not fluent to not respond with guesses or autotranslation, I apologise, but I've been frustratedly bashing my head against a wall for a week on this issue and my supply of patience is long depleted.
@gsuberland you didn't - I did respond with what my wife said (and she's as Chinese as they come :) ). I didn't find you grumpy - and I understand where you're coming from. Chinese as a language can be unbearably frustrating at times...
@petrillic yeah it's one of those frustrating cases where the feature isn't common enough in hobbyist designs to show up in lists like that, while also having a bunch of specific details (hard gold vs. just ENIG, the edge chamfer, pin tip chamfers, the board side vs. the mating connector, etc.) that are always talked about in close enough proximity to the actual term I want, making it near impossible to distinguish through any deductive process or automated translation.
@gsuberland so I get your frustration and apologize in advance for the half-answer, but is there a point-to-translate answer in one of Bunnie's guides to Shenzhen? I had a quick look through the free first edition and found the term for card edge connector but I don't know enough to say that the translation includes hard-gold plating.
@phenidone others suggested this too. card edge (卡边缘) is under the connectors page, and when I search it I get pictures of card edge connectors (the type of connector that a plated edge would slot into).
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