SMT placement equipment

A pick and place machine is a machine that is used in the manufacture of printed circuit boards, to place the components on the circuit board are then soldered in a soldering process. Placement machines have been around since the mid-1970s.

Operation

The individual parts are available from the placement machine in its component supply station ( "feeder" ) in the following forms:

  • Blister strips on wheels ( " Tape & Reel " ) for most SMD components,
  • Trays with depressions ( " tray " ) for larger ICs,
  • With wired components as a belt ( " Belt" ),
  • With larger components in plastic rods ( " Tubes" ).

A mounting head which is movable in three axes and can rotate around the Z axis, sucks usually by vacuum a component of the belt / tray, checks the position by means of a camera system, calculates the angle and position offset to the nominal position, and places the component on the circuit board. All components are assembled, the PCB is transported via a conveyor system and is supplied with a new, empty PCB.

Modern machines work to increase the throughput with multiple placer heads and so-called " gun - heads " that are able to accommodate several components, which reduces the travel time between refilling and PCB. The circuit boards are normally in the form of a panel on which a plurality of similar, but different layouts are combined on a large board in a standard format, separated later. This reduces the transport time per board significantly, thus increasing the throughput of a production line.

Modern automated insertion are similar in principle to a flatbed plotter, wherein the circuit board takes the place of the paper, the mounting head of the pin and the components of the supply pin Magazines. In older machines was often moves the PCB instead of the component, but this is problematic with the concatenation with the upstream and downstream process steps ( paste printing, soldering).

In most cases the placement machines are modular, so you can have different component supply stations, Bestückerköpfe, camera systems etc. grow.

See also

  • SIPLACE
  • Machine
  • Construction and connection technology of the electronics
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