Manual Pick & Place assist devices, and how to select one 1

[RAndres]

I'm considering picking up one of those desktop pick and place assist devices. Usually a set of slides that allow an operator to move their hand over the pcb without disturbing previously placed parts and solder, along with a vacuum pick up to get parts and precisely place them. They often offer a display capability as an add-on. Here is one device I'm considering:

https://www.manncorp.com/component-placement-and-handling/smt-place-2000-manual-pick-and-place.html

They range in cost from ~$1k to ~$10k. Do any of you have experience with these, and can guide me on a sensible selection? Is the vision capability worth adding? Anything else to look out for?

 

[IRstuff]

Since the placement orientation and accuracy is all manual, having a vision system would seem to be a good idea.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
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[itsmoked]

Having manually pick'n place'd thousands of boards I just don't see the point to dropping that kind of change. Not to mention you can buy full-on PaPs for about $6K.

For my manual PaP I have a 2 foot by 1 foot table top that glides right and left about 14". Standing over that without touching it is a 5 sided box. The sides are about 2 inches. There is a two inch gap cut front to back of the top box in the center. The left entire side of top (left of the gap) is piano hinged at the back so it can be lifted up exposing the gliding platform.

The top box has four of those rubber feet that screw in and out like on a washing machine to level and adjust the top box height above the boards.

You open the left side load all the boards you want to stuff on the glider. Then you close it.

Now you can pile parts on both sides of the gap and use it as your work surface. The stuffed boards glide back and forth below the top deck only exposed in the narrow gap. Add a vacuum pick-up, a circular lit magnifier, and a clipboard spring bail on a block of plastic. You can easily pick up SMD parts and place them on the boards without accidentally touching the partly stuffed boards and scrambling the stuffed parts. You use a finger under the front edge of the top box to herd the glider back and forth precisely. Works like a charm.

You work the same part on each board so once you find it's location you just repeat it across the 1, 2, 3, 5, 10, 12 boards (depending on size) then go to the next part. Step-and-repeat. When done you flip up the left side lid and cart the boards to reflow.

Keith Cress
kcress -

http://www.flaminsystems.com

 

[RAndres]

Thanks for your thoughts. Itsmoked, I like the method you're describing. This will be to build small numbers of R and D boards in house. If we need higher quantities, I doubt we can beat the pricing of a dedicated board house. For those small numbers, getting an automated machine programmed and loaded with parts will take longer than building a few by hand. That leads me to the "semi-auto" devices. I like the idea of a precise Z only moving vacuum tool with rotation. I know when I got a real screen print device instead of using tape and cardboard my level of rework went down due to more precise solder paste deposit, and I'm hoping this will have similar benefit in accuracy as well as a time savings.