A sintered blank is a shape, not a part. Thickness, flatness, warp, edge condition and surface finish are all created after the furnace — and that is the half of the chain this shop runs.
Two columns, because a capability page that only has one is a brochure.
| Step | Where it runs | What we control |
|---|---|---|
| Blank sintering | Sent out | Grade and blank size are specified with the ceramics plant; we do not sinter |
| Green machining, pre-sinter | In-house | Shape and allowance before shrinkage |
| Lapping & grinding | In-house | Thickness, parallelism, flatness, warp |
| Polishing | In-house | Surface finish on bonding and sealing faces |
| Cutting to outline | In-house, laser sent out | Kerf, edge chip count, corner radius |
| Drilling & chamfer | In-house | Hole position, chip-free entry and exit |
| Cleaning & drying | In-house | Residue removal before measurement |
| Dimension & geometry measurement | In-house | The reported numbers |
| Bond-layer scan (SAM) | Sent out | Nothing — we do not own a scanning acoustic microscope and will not substitute a visual check |
| Copper brazing, AMB / DBC / DPC | Not offered | — |
Delete any line you cannot actually meet. A tolerance range that is aspirational is worse than no range at all.
It is part 1 and part 400 being the same part.
Grinding and polishing parameters drift. A wheel wears, a slurry ages, a fixture settles. The drift does not show up as one visibly bad part — it shows up as a thickness spread across the lot, or a warp that appears at piece 60.
So the control is not a final inspection at the end. It is a reading taken at the start of the run, at fixed intervals through it, and at the end, written down, and compared. When the reading moves, the run stops and the wheel is dressed — before the rest of the lot inherits the drift.
What that means for you: the deliverable is not only the parts. It is the reading log, so you can see the spread rather than take our word for it.
Six numbers decide whether a ceramic part is usable. Everything else is secondary.
| Feature | Instrument | Why it matters downstream |
|---|---|---|
| Thickness | Micrometer, calibrated — INTERVAL | Sets thermal resistance and bond-line thickness |
| TTV | INSTRUMENT | Uneven thickness means uneven heat spreading across the die |
| Warp | INSTRUMENT / PLATE AND DIAL | Drives die-attach pressure uniformity; a warped plate cracks dies |
| Surface finish, Ra | Roughness tester — RANGE | Bond strength and seal integrity |
| Edge chips | Optical, MAGNIFICATION | A chip is a crack starter under thermal cycling |
| Bond layer | SAM, outsourced | Voids and delamination invisible from outside |
If a feature needs an instrument we do not have, it is said at quoting — not discovered after the lot is made. That rule applies to the whole shop, and it is written on the quality page too.
Answered here so the first email can be about the part.
No — we do not sinter. The blank is either supplied by you, or bought to your grade specification from a ceramics plant we work with, and it stays a pass-through item on the quote with the plant's certificate attached. We would rather show you that line than hide it inside a part price.
One piece for machining. Ceramic is not like injection molding — there is no tooling to amortise, so there is no reason to force a minimum. What does scale is setup: the first piece on a new drawing carries the wheel dressing and fixture time, and the tenth does not.
BREAKAGE POLICY — AGREE IN WRITING BEFORE THE RUN
The general split is: blanks we sourced are our risk, blanks you supplied are yours unless the break is a process error on our side. Whatever the split, it is stated on the quote, not argued after.
Dimension report on the critical callouts, thickness and TTV readings, warp, Ra, edge chip count, and the raw reading log for the lot. If a SAM scan is required, the report comes from the inspection partner and carries their name, not ours relabelled.
No. AMB, DBC and DPC are brazing processes at 800–900 °C under vacuum with a reactive metal foil — a different plant, a different furnace, a different yield problem. If your program needs copper bonded, you need an AMB house. We can machine and measure what they make.
Two or three dimensions usually decide whether the part works. Mark those; they get measured and reported, and the rest get checked normally.
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