Practical guides and precision equipment for separating PCB panels — from manual V-cut and router depaneling to automated production lines.
Every method trades off cost, precision, and stress on components differently. Here's how the main techniques compare.
Grooves are scored along the board edges during manufacturing, then snapped apart by hand or machine. Fast and cheap, but limited to straight cuts on thicker boards.
Read the guide →A CNC-controlled spindle cuts along breakaway tabs for smooth, burr-free edges — ideal for dense boards with delicate components like BGAs and QFNs.
Read the guide →No tooling required, but high mechanical stress makes it suitable only for low-cost, low-density boards with strong solder pads.
Read the guide →A dual-slide positioning router built for precise final cutting of small PCB assemblies — mobile boards, PDAs, and PC interface cards — with minimal mechanical stress.
Plain-language answers to the questions engineers actually search for.