PWB President Bill Birch said that after a launch pad failure, NASA brought in the company's Interconnect Stress Test (IST) system as an additional method to determine root cause when no other test was able to find the problem.

"The traditional systems all confirmed good product, but IST was able to uncover the processing defect. Not only did we find the problem, but we worked directly with the board manufacturer and confirmed to NASA that the problem had been addressed for future product," said Birch.

"For today's product complexity, it is proving necessary to go beyond traditional visual criteria and use accelerated stress testing as a viable means to quantify interconnect reliability," Birch explained. "This endorsement by NASA is a major confirmation to PWB of its deployment of its technology throughout the mil/aero industry. NASA will be adding IST to all of its future programs, and we're now in continuing discussions with them."

PWB Interconnect Solutions Inc. received the following letter of appreciation from NASA:

National Aeronautics and
Space Administration
Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
20771

PWB Interconnect Solutions Inc.
Attn:  Mr. Bill Birch
235 Stafford Road, West, Unit 103
Nepean, Ontario K2H 9C1
CANADA

Subject:  Letter of Appreciation

PWB Interconnect Solutions, Inc., supported the investigation of items critical to the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) Glory space flight project for many months. Throughout this long time, your support was always prompt, usually at the time of our call to you, or next-day at the latest, and your reports were always delivered in a timely manner. You and your colleague, Mr. Paul Reid, provided Interconnect Stress Testing (IST) results, along with detailed analysis of these results and expert guidance for understanding these, and suggestions for process improvements which were always on target. Your support led to a body of results that was broad, detailed, and objective.  This proved to be essential for our assessment of replacement items for the GSFC Glory space flight project.

Early in the investigation, it became clear that optical microscopy would not be sufficient to provide a statistically relevant sample for the many thousands of key interfaces in each of the replacement boards. IST was proposed as a way to objectively test the large numbers of these interfaces. PWB Interconnect Solutions, Inc., was asked to provide test data, and you did. But your service was much more comprehensive, and much more useful, than just data and reports. Your support, and that of Mr. Reid, enhanced many project meetings on the IST findings by providing information on how those results and post-test microsections compared to other product tested during your years of experience with high reliability product. Your assessment of the data established that many items initially produced for the Glory product had a random distribution of distinct failure modes, making these items unsuitable for flight use. Your suggestions materially aided process-improvements with each iteration of the item-vendor, resulting in the production of improved items exhibiting much less random behavior. The IST reports were ideal counterparts to the optical inspections conducted at GSFC, allowing us to look for process indicators as well as performance-based data in the examinations.

The support of you and your team at PWB Interconnect Solutions, Inc., has shown the value of IST testing of printed wiring boards where leading edge designs utilize many key features in each interconnection, and have tens of thousands of interconnections per printed wiring board. The integrity, experience, and candor exhibited by you and Mr. Reid were of fundamental service to our investigation, and those qualities have convinced us of the worth of utilizing your company for such testing.

Sincerely,

Dr. Henning Leidecker, Chief Failure Analyst, Electrical Division 
Diane M. Kolos, Leader, Materials Testing & Applications Group