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DEK 288 machine...

stefo

#17651

DEK 288 machine... | 19 September, 2001

Hi Jeff,

I'm sorry my post isn't related to 0201's, but I thought I'd ask the expert since we have access to you...

You may know this already, but it's a buyers market out there for used equipment. We currently have a 265 MK-1 that works fine, but we've wanted to replace with something more current for a while.

We've found a DEK288 out on the market for a decent price. I know the 288 is discontined, and Craig Brown explained to me why it was discontined and replaced with the Infinity.

I flew out to look at the machine, and it seemed in decent shape...it was used, yes, but looked okay. I brought a stencil, board, and solder paste with me. I figured that a good check to do was to program the stencil and PCB, do a print, and then look at the quality of the print. If things looked okay, then I could be reasonably sure that the base machine should be sound. However, when I arrived, I was told there were no squeegees. So we did everything else but actually print a board. The vision system worked as advertised found everything, and we set the pressure to zero so the machine wouldn't alarm. Can I assume that the machine will print acceptably?

I know this maybe a unusual question to ask you, and there may be some hesitation about advising me, or anyone about buying used equipment, but I thought I would ask what I might be missing, or not seeing, if I didn't do an actual print. I've been told that what was demonstrated to me shows that the printer is sound...

Just to let you know, I've been a DEK user for many years. At the company I worked at in the past in California, we purchased the 4th 265 Mk-1 that was ever sold in the USA, even got to meet Ian McVoy...

-Steve Gregory-

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Jeff Schake

#17655

DEK 288 machine... | 20 September, 2001

If you were successful in running the machine in dry cycle mode, then I would expect with new squeegees that the prints would be acceptable. To give you more tangible data on what you may expect from the actual print results, maybe you could run the following test. Change to step mode and make sure the forward print direction is selected. Step through the run sequence and when you reach the point just before the print carriage will move across the stencil, lift the front cover open and perform a manual print (using whatever clean edge you may find as a mock squeegee blade) while the board is lifted at print height. The only thing I am not sure about is whether the cover is locked at this stage. You'll have to check yourself. Close the cover and then continue with the run. This is a worst case scenario print since you are doing it manually, but it may give you a little more confidence in the results you are likely to see and get a better feeling for paste alignment, tooling support/planarity, and stencil aperture to pad gasket.

Note: My recommendation is not necessarily endorsed by DEK since it is not a standard procedure, but rather my own wild idea. Just exercise caution when working under the open sliding cover.

-Jeff

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