Setting up a 'real' SMT line - advice? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 26, 2023, 05:01:36 pm
content: We're at a point where we're seriously planning out a real in-house SMT production line. This decision is not based on volume/cost, but on the need to support high mix/low volume production with often very tight timelines, and support shorter R&D cycles on boards we don't want to be hand assembling. We've considered going with something like the XY or Neoden equipment to start with, but it doesn't seem like that equipment will last us long enough to be worth trouble of setting up and swapping out when we inevitably want to upgrade. So I'm currently looking at options for 'real' equipment, with a new placement machine, probably an improved manual stencil printer, and possibly a used reflow oven if we run into a good opportunity. (Unfortunately most of the used inventory for this stuff is on the wrong side of the country from us.) At some point in the future we would upgrade to an automatic stencil printer, and otherwise expand in feeders and the overall line from there. We have a good amount of floor space picked out, with plenty of power and air capacity. We also have experience with bringing up in-house CNC manufacturing capacity, so have some idea of the amount of workflow and tooling support that these sorts of things inevitably entail.I've got pricing for Hanwha, Yamaha, and Panasonic equipment so far (and yes, the pricing is eye-watering), and I can look at brochures and promo videos all day, but that all only tells me so much. For those of you who have gone down this road:- what's not covered in the sales pitch that you found was important to know when getting started?- what's been your experience with getting started in any particular brand/class of equipment?- per the above, any particular machines or brands you found to be easier or harder to get started on?- what other equipment or accessories did you find were essential to support the SMT line? (aside from 'more feeders', that's already on the list!)

author: loki42
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 27, 2023, 01:38:34 am
content: I've had minimal problems with the pick and place section (with my Universal Genesis machines) apart from trim pots which have been very picky about nozzle choice. Check you're getting the nozzles you need, the UIC stuff has different heads with different nozzles and it's pretty confusing. There's a big spreadsheet for what picks what on what head. Oh trays have been a bit of trouble too, I think because my belt alignment isn't prefect and I don't know how to set it up.Printing has been a lot of trouble for me, mostly around board support and getting the parameters right. I've just bought spi to try to catch errors. The on machine 2d inspection is handy but it can't capture volume errors (coverage is good but too thick/thin).Is the Panasonic similar price to the hanwha and Yamaha? I thought they were much higher end, similar to Fuji.

author: SMTech
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 27, 2023, 07:35:51 am
content: Understand your requirement first and foremost. Work out your inventory, your changeover, what parts might need to be loaded into feeders ready to switch between products. What feeders those parts need. Genuine low volume high mix is directly targeted by two manufacturers not on your list; Europlacer and MyData. Both of these have solutions that make owning a lot of "feeders" cheaper in a space efficient manner. And save yourself the pain and buy an automatic printer.Get an idea of pricing on consumable parts like nozzles. Get hands on time with feeders and software see how intuitive or fiddly things are. Establish if you think you would be best served with "smart" feeders. Understand the software options included and your own requirements for things like traceability, these things cost extra and are sometimes part of expensive suites.@loki42have you looked at GridLok/QuikTool/Matrixhttps://quik-tool.com/https://psasystems.com/smt?

author: loki42
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 27, 2023, 01:39:46 pm
content: I've looked into grid loc etc for my printer and given I'm only doing a very low number of different boards (very low mix) dedicated tooling makes more sense for us i think. I attempted to get some 3d printed by a professional 3d printer but the flatness was terrible so I just made some on our press brake. It's working well. I'm planning to machine some vacuum fixtures at some point too. I've got some of the official UIC board supports too and the similar ones from count on tools.Other thing I forgot pnp wise that was wisely said by smtech, make sure you can put down the parts you want with the machines you are thinking about. Some are very limited with part height or can't feed from trays. If you need to place odd form you might either need to place it by hand or limit your machine options.

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 27, 2023, 02:56:47 pm
content: Thanks folks, this is all helpful. I am planning to arrange some hands-on time with a couple of machines before we make a final decision to suss out some of the software/workflow considerations.Quote from: loki42 on June 27, 2023, 01:38:34 amThey're all in the same general ballpark, but the Panasonic is a bit more expensive--or the same price for a few less feeders. Seems like everyone gives meaningless list prices with a big discount on everything, which makes comparisons annoying depending on how they break out that discount and option charges. For reference, this is for the Hanwha SM485, Panasonic AM100, and Yamaha YMR20-1. Several other manufacturers to look into of course, there are more options than I would have guessed before I started counting.Quote from: SMTech on June 27, 2023, 07:35:51 amThanks, will bump those up the list to look at.Quote from: loki42 on June 27, 2023, 01:39:46 pmLack of internal trays is a downside for the Hanwha, it's either give up 23 feeder lanes for two trays, or pay $50k for the side tray magazine, neither is attractive for our current part mix.

author: jmelson
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 27, 2023, 03:10:16 pm
content: Big items to consider :1. height of tallest component - especially electrolytic capacitors2. width of widest component - like CPUs and FPGAs3. What nozzles are available for the machine4. what's the smallest part you will be placing5. finest lead pitch of ICsIf you only will have one P&P, you want a machien that can handle the FULL range of parts you will use. On a multi-nozzle machine, if the nozzles are too close together, you have issues with the parts bumping into each other and messing up the alignment.Does the machine have up-looking cameras or flying vision? The flying vision is a lot faster.And, of course, feeders!!! The quality of the feeders is really key! My first P&P had mechanical feeders that were always jamming and not pulling cover tape reliably. It was a HUGE pain. My newer machine has electronic feeders that do quite a bit better.How will you set up a job on the P&P? For both of my machines, I wrote programs to convert the placement file of my CAD system to what the machine needed for import, then I had to assign feeders and get the machine to accept the setup. Complexity and ease of use of the software during setup can make a HUGE difference. Also, self-diagnostic features are pretty important. A machine that tells you exactly what went wrong "Component from feeder # 43 X dimension too small 0.3mm" is much better than one that is vague "error ocurred".Jon

author: SMTech
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 27, 2023, 03:15:23 pm
content: Quote from: ajb on June 27, 2023, 02:56:47 pmInternal tray king is a Eurplacer iineo, it can be fitted with a tray area in the middle of the machine over the conveyor which can hold 10 trays, or a tray of lose parts or strips on sticky tape, your choice. Grippers, tall parts it does it all if you pay enough.

author: loki42
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 12:57:25 am
content: Internal maybe... but a universal instruments machine with PTFs you can have 100s of stacks of trays. The trays are automatically removed when empty and parts can be gang picked from the PTF conveyors. The PTFs are also pretty cheap second hand. Inspection during new part introduction is more annoying than with direct pick though as there's no camera on the ptf side so you have to pick the part with the ptf so see if the orientation is correct. I assume the Fuji, Panasonic etc tray feeding options would be similar.

author: SMTech
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 07:50:49 am
content: Quote from: loki42 on June 28, 2023, 12:57:25 amEvery machine has its gimmick and its ideal target audience, every machine also has a PTF option, they mostly take away feeder slots and cost $$ whereas internal space is free(ish) (the Europlacer table does cost money). You just have to work out which niche you are in, "higher end" is a difficult thing to quantify, you'd never try and built millions of iPhones or Pi's with a Europlacer line, they're not designed to compete with an NXT. NXT lines have their own limitations.We had similar deliberations when we last looked @ p&p we knew we needed to fit a certain number of feeders and trays and that basically was not possible with a single "conventional" placer, the double sized machines back then were not flex placers. That left Europlacers, long MyDatas, maybe the iPulse M20 or standalone machines that take feeders on all sides and have a placement area you can use as you like (Essemtec/Dima/Fritsch/Autotronik). In theory it could also have included Universal (ouch); the Panasonic AM100 (poorly sold then); Contact C5 (looks sorta cool, nobody buys it); or Mimot (because we all know them). And there we were boxed in our niche, luckily the choice is better today, more machines like the RS1 are truly flexible but we would still need 2 of most and at that point you can trigger the gripe mentioned elsewhere, load balancing software suites that manage your multi machine line.

author: loki42
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 12:20:32 pm
content: Yeah, you loose a nozzle changer for each PTF with UIC but who needs 4 x 77 nozzles... you don't loose any feeder slots. There are for sure better machines for specific jobs. Feeders for UIC are giant compared to Mycronic and the handles are designed by people who haven't seen a human. I think used UIC are a decent deal used but I wouldn't touch them new. The company is all running on Lotus domino and I don't think they've updated any of their software in the last 20 years... I think finding a company that is actually friendly and easy to deal with would be much better.I think some of the machines like the Europlace, Mycronic and maybe Essemtec can feed from cut tape easily which would be great for prototyping. You mentioned sticking them down or is there specific cut tape feeders? Like these things that I'm not sure how they work...https://www.nozzles4smt.com/STRIPFEEDERS-mod-Ver-2-Series_c_135.html

author: SMTech
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 01:01:36 pm
content: Quote from: loki42 on June 28, 2023, 12:20:32 pmEssemtec has an equivalent of that, it just works like custom tray, its a bit of pain to use to be honest, I tend to try and use a real feeder. The count on tools solution probably fits in a PTF and is more limited in component height. I can't recall what Mycronics solution was, Europlacer you can literally use sticky tape, and they will custom machine you things too. Europlacer also used to have a feeder element specifically for cut tape, I have no idea how it was different. The loose part thing however is very new. Yamaha offered the CoT tray, I think Hanwha has a fancy feeder that can handle tape strips but I'm not sure how short they can be or what the wastage is like. There are also "FeederFingers" for many brands, I think they try and copy the Agilis method onto a standard feeder.I agree finding a company you can work with is also a good idea, if getting information and quotes out of them is difficult, imagine the support. We are doing some investment right now, I have one failure to reply, I'm not chasing. There are also some very different approaches to servicing...

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 04:16:00 pm
content: Any thoughts on backup pins, height mapping, placement force monitoring features? I don't think we need to worry about it, but those are features that show up in some brochures but not others, so I'm curious how widely applicable they are. We're not doing max width boards/panels, but some of our current tab routed panels have a fair bit of flex. Of course those could be redesigned into smaller panels and/or wider frames.Reflow ovens: Sales reps are telling me 7-8 zones minimum for lead free, but I've also heard from a couple of people who are getting good results with 3-zone systems. Given that throughput isn't a big concern, I'm interested in what anyone else has to say on that.Re: Trays, not sure about other brands, but Hanwha offer a PTF that installs on the conveyer side. So you don't lose any feeder slots, but do lose the dual conveyer/shuttle option, for whatever that's worth. Still more expensive than I can justify without more tray parts, but would be a decent future upgrade option.Re: Cut tape, Panasonic also have one of those cut-tape-on-tray thing, which seems like any machine that supports trays ought to be able to offer. A fixed piece of cut tape is just a 1xN matrix tray after all. I guess the difference would be in how easy they make it to program that sort of thing. Those Feeder Fingers look interesting, will add those to the list. I would imagine the fancy autoloading feeders from any brand would be able to handle cut tape, but I'm sure a standard electronic feeder plus a Feeder Finger is a cheaper way to go.For our purposes, being able to put two trays inside the machine, one for tray parts and one for cut tape, should work pretty well. By the time we need more tray capacity I will be much less concerned about cut tape. (Not that I'm even that worried about cut tapenow, but it would be nice to use up what we have on hand.)Quote from: SMTech on June 28, 2023, 01:01:36 pmFor sure. Of course that super helpful and responsive rep who holds your hand through the whole purchase process might vanish the moment their commission comes in, so hard to gauge that up front sometimes....Thanks all!

author: SparkyStan
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 08:56:17 pm
content: Quote from: ajb on June 28, 2023, 04:16:00 pmOne thing you can consider for board flex is to use carriers, basically a rigid fixture for thin and flex PCBs usually. I haven't used one yet as we alleviated our flex by decreasing panel size but I have spoken to a company that manufacturers small IoT devices and they use carriers for their panels to support the, through pick and place and reflow with good success.Quote from: ajb on June 28, 2023, 04:16:00 pmIn my experience, our 3 zone oven has worked well for panels less than 12x12" in size (1-6 layers so far, 2oz outer layers, 0.5oz inner layers). One thing to consider is if you plan on larger boards with heavy copper and large planes, the 3 zone might show it's limitations and require more tuning of your profile to ensure good soldering (i.e slower/longer profile and/or higher temperatures).Quote from: ajb on June 28, 2023, 04:16:00 pmI'm only familiar with the ASM E/X feeders but I can just load cut tapes into feeders as normal, they just need a cover tape extension to go back to the peeling mechanism. This is nice as I just treat cut tapes as you would a reel. If you're not maxing out your feeders slots, consider seeing what the feeders of your options are capable of cut tape wise. I've definitely used some 10 part 0402 cut tapes from a sample kit in a pinch a few times but we have set minimums for parts depending on pitch as they are cumbersome to handle below a certain length. IIRC the Essmetec sales guy mentioned they could feed cut tapes down to 1 inch as well.

author: jayx
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 28, 2023, 10:43:51 pm
content: Would be usefull if you let us know what you exactly mean by "high mix/low volume". You need to take into consideration how many feeders you need in the machine to assembly your most complex PCB, how often you're going to swap the components in the feeders (sales pitch/brochures rarely mention how long it takes to swap a tape in the feeder and set it up for use in the machine), is setup changeover time priority over placement speed or the other way round.It will also have some impact on the other machines selection. For paste printing, it may be better to look at jet printing. For reflow oven, perhaps vapour phase.Other equipment to consider is dry storage for moisture sensitive components, wahing machine for the PCBs, x-ray inspection, rework station for bottom terminated components (BGAs, QFNs, etc.).

author: SMTech
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 12:13:04 pm
content: A larger longer oven will increase throughput. A short oven with few zones tries to match the profile your paste would like to function against what is possible with the size of your board and the mass of components placed upon it. If you read a solder paste datasheet you will note there are 3-4 key periods. Fewer zones gives you less opportunity to bring every area on the board up to the windows requested by your paste profile and leaves you more reliant on conveyor speed, which in turn makes it more likely you will break the time rules instead. 6-8 vertical zones is a decent compromise, fits in an oven that is not too ridiculous (4m or less) and this is also where many major brands start with their ranges. My experience when we purchased ours was that of the major brands Heller was easily the value choice, it was cheaper and had more features than its rivals, BTU wasn't far behind. Similar spec'd well known Chinese brands were cheaper (about 25%). Its possible once its 20 years old you'd choose a more expensive brand 2nd user, but Hellers are everywhere. That said I visited a firm that primarily made boards for the European Space Agency and they ran a 3 zone oven, but it was a good one from ERSA.Pipped and routed panels with a lot of flex will need support, you can do that with pins or systems like grid-lok. I wouldn't underestimate the importance of board support, on our Essemtec, boards are supported by manually adjusted pins, these are hard to place accurately under a double side board, hard to pack densely for a complex flexible panel and hard to set at just the right height. There was grid-lok style option, I wish I had chosen it but at the time it wasn't needed. This can have a radical affect on placement accuracy as the board surface isn't exactly where the machine expects it to be. Some but not all placement machines measure the placement force which would help in these cases or with warpage.Other toys like X-ray, washing and even AOI are for later when volume, customer or complexity demands them

author: loki42
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 12:29:38 pm
content: I totally agree again with board support. I'm running 0.6 - 1.2mm boards and a lot of the problems have been board support related with printing and placement.

author: SMTech
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 02:53:37 pm
content: Its been mentioned in here, but I would suggest that while Jet printing sounds cool, no stencils to store, no waiting for stencils etc etc. You cannot buy those platforms without spending well into 6 figures, so you need to be not buying a lot of stencils before they pay for themselves, older Mycronics are out of support, they work best with special pastes and I bet servicing/care is a delight. There are no good manual printers, Reprint and PBT make decent(ish) Semi-auto's - you can buy old EKRA, MPM or DEKs everywhere and you should be able to find spares & support too.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 03:40:46 pm
content: Quote from: SMTech on June 29, 2023, 02:53:37 pmYeah, stencil jetting sounds good at first sight, but seems an expensive option and only really useful for niche cases. Leadtime isn't a good argument as you always have the PCB leadtime, and stencil leadtime will rarely be longer.If storage is an issue, use unframed stenciles - there is at least one system, don't recall the name, that uses holes around the edge of an unframed stencil to mount it into a special frame that tensions it to make it like a framed one.Maybe for places running very high mixes perhaps ?

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 08:27:43 pm
content: Quote from: jayx on June 28, 2023, 10:43:51 pmSure. For reference, our most complex board currently in production is ~90 BOM lines and ~300 total placements between top and bottom, roughly 130 8mm equivalent feeder lanes. BUT, we do NOT need to be doing that particular one in-house right off the bat or possibly ever, and there's room to knock a few BOM lines off the build anyway. Our initial board builds will be less than half that (both BOM lines and total placements), so I'm thinking we might start with about 50 feeders with room to grow from there. No BGAs, a couple QFNs, everything else is 0402(imperial) up to ~25mm QFP. A day to set up and a day to run 50-100 boards would be great to start, with the idea that we can add feeders/carts later on to speed up changeover.Quote from: jayx on June 28, 2023, 10:43:51 pmFrom conversations I've had so far, it seems like a vapor phase batch oven wouldn't save much in terms of purchase cost, especially compared to used conventional inline ovens, plus we'd eventually want to replace it with an inline setup anyway. So I don't think that makes a lot of sense for us. On printing, coincidentally both jet printing and used MPM stencil printers came up in a conversation I had earlier today, and the latter seems a much better way to go as SMTech notes.

author: jayx
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 09:46:33 pm
content: I've seen a demo of Essemtec (Fox if I remember correctly) with paste jetting option which cost (again if remember correctly) ~£20k, and was quite impressed with the speed and accuracy. So may be worth to consider if you go for this machine, as a stand alone probably not worth the price. If you decide to go for stencil printer, you should consider DEK VectorGuard system.As for vapour phase, there is also potential running cost saving (less energy usage, no need for nitrogen), and I think much better solder joints quality, possibly less solder bridges and tombstones, less problems if you have large and heavy components, finally potential to significantly reduce voiding (if you need low voiding) if you go for vacuum option. Obviously there is the liquid (Galden) cost to consider, and not many second hand machines available.For changeover consider how many tapes you'll need to swap if you change between a different PCBs. If you have 50 BOM lines on one board and 50 on the other, but only 10 are common, there is a lot to swap if you only have 50 feeders.

author: Mangozac
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 29, 2023, 11:01:09 pm
content: Quote from: ajb on June 29, 2023, 08:27:43 pmWe run a 25 year old MPM UP2000 printer and it still runs like a champion (albeit with the odd repair but nothing that has been catastrophic). Not that I'm suggesting you should go for something that old but based on our experience I would certainly consider a newer MPM printer when it comes time to upgrade (which I will likely do in another year or two before this one gets that bit too old).I was told that jet printers require special paste and there is a lot of waste/hassle of cleaning the jetting head but that may have just been marketing talk.

author: Reckless
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 30, 2023, 05:39:53 am
content: Quote from: ajb on June 29, 2023, 08:27:43 pmI have 3 used MPM UP2500's for sale if interested in Chicago. Highly recommended, last forever and if ever a part is needed generally very cheap to find as it was the most popular machine sold. MPM still supports them in terms of technical support for FREE. The only SMT manufacturer that has friendly support.

author: Reckless
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 30, 2023, 06:06:02 am
content: Quote from: jayx on June 29, 2023, 09:46:33 pmI have seen the Essemtec Fox live in person, it's definitely my favorite PNP in terms of form factor but I have reservations on it for actual production use (40+ hours/week). I saw it spill parts at 100% speed back in 2018. My feeling is that it is the most expensive prototyping machine and is slow when compared to other brands. The jetting feature only started working recently in last year or so. They have sold ~250 units in 8 years since launch in 2016. I think its because they are pricing it too high. It does have nifty features like doing 008004 parts (Smaller than 0402, 0201, 01005) using 4mm feeders:

author: Reckless
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 30, 2023, 06:36:48 am
content: Quote from: SMTech on June 29, 2023, 12:13:04 pmFor ovens I strongly recommend the Essemtec ovens. They were designed to replace 7 zone ovens and have some crazy space age technology in order to flow air properly/evenly across the entire pcb. I have had a number of ovens in my life including a few Hellers (1 brand new), goldstar ovens, chinese ovens, madell, vitronics, manncorp. The only one that gave NO issues were the Essemtecs. Everyone who visits my facility is generally in disbelief that a small oven can do what the bigger Hellers can do and much simpler to use/manage. They are soo good they are used to make clear contact lenses due to the level of swiss precision. In my opinion this is Essemtecs best product. I've owned 8 of them when running small production lines. Heating element never breaks, nor the controller.

author: ajb
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 30, 2023, 04:04:31 pm
content: Quote from: jayx on June 29, 2023, 09:46:33 pmThe very system we were discussing, in fact. As I understand it, you pay somewhat more than that for the factory-installed optional components to support jetting, and then you pay somewhat more than that again for the field-installable jetting equipment. Given that it adds up to about the cost of a standalone printer, I only see it making sense if you simply do not have the floor space for one. Or I guess if you absolutely need to do same-day prototypes and you're also getting a whole LPKF or whatever setup for in-house board fabrication.-----As far as placement machines, it's looking like we either go for cost effectiveness at meeting our near term needs or we go for flexibility for the future. As it stands, and with the caveat that I need to consolidate my notes and review the numbers again, the former looks like Hanwha or Yamaha and the latter looks like Europlacer. The other options generally cost more for nebulous benefit to our current needs, or have some sort of tradeoff in feeder/component capacity.Europlacer definitely has a higher up front price tag, but that comes with some pretty attractive capabilities. In its favor, it does look like the ii-Feed tape feeders are much less expensive than conventional feeders, even accounting for the more expensive carts and magazines needed to support them. Having more internal tray capacity so we could use cut tapes to stretch beyond feeder capacity is also attractive, and we have in-house CNC machining capability to make trays and fixtures as needed. I'm trying not to get TOO smitten with Europlacer.Again, that's all based on preliminary notes I need to review, and I have one or two more conversations to follow up on yet. The plan is to get it narrowed down to a couple of options and then try to schedule some hands-on time with the machines before we make a final decision. I appreciate all the input!

author: MR
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 01, 2023, 12:30:26 pm
content: Does anyone know how Essemtec implemented the Z-axis of the nozzles? Which kind of actuator they are using for that?