Process-specific PCB Thickness Modeling

Predicting printed circuit board (PCB) thickness has not historically been a difficult task. With lower layer count boards you can afford for the prediction per layer to be wrong by a relatively large amount and still meet thickness criteria. As layer counts in multilayer boards increase, the ability to predict final thickness after lamination becomes more difficult and more important. All else equal, as the layer count increases, the error you can tolerate per layer must be reduced.
This paper discusses a method to design a thickness prediction model for a specific board shop process. This is accomplished by running carefully constructed experiments and assembling the results into a mathematical prediction model. The results will show how, in one case, thickness prediction errors were reduced by more than 25%.