SMT production

Ari,

I would suggest you make a checklist of all your requirements (not just large scale production) and prioritize them with weights assigned to each. Fill in the checklist for each equipment and manufacturer and you'll have the results out.

I would look at the following (not in order of priorities):

1. Design of the equipment in terms of MTBFs and MTTRs 2. Ease of programming and operation 3. Maintainability 4. Support from manufacturer (especially in my area) 5. Component and PCB Handling Capability 6. No. of feeder positions 7. Type of feeders 8. Cost per placement over a period of say 1-2 years. Including running costs like air/power/floor space/maintenance cost/time for which machine is down for scheduled PMs/breakdowns/no. of operators/etc... and also the capital cost - interest and depreciation costs. Then compare the total cost of manufacturing the required no. of assemblies for a period of 1-2 years and it should be straight forward.

I would certainly vouch for Assembleon's A-Series (say an AX5 and an AQ). You could add in a Topaz XiII for filling in as a line balancer. The A-Series has a high component handling capability from 01005 to large connectors, bare dies, etc..., placement force control for ALL components, low floor space, single operator per line for Placement process, low maintenance cost, high redundancy due to modular structure and high throughputs compared to other equipment with same IDEAL speeds.

You should also look into the factor of capacity enhancement in future and hence with the AX you get scalability WITHOUT adding another equipment starting from 33Kcph UPTO 110Kcph (IPC 9850 speeds), in increments of 5.5Kcph (IPC speeds). Further there are a lot of feeder positions enabling common setups for a large no. of assemblies thus reducing changeover times which are more-or-less ignored during the decision making process.

For printing I would go in for DEK Infinity and my choice for reflow would be 1-BTU, 2-SMT, 3-ERSA in the same order.

Regards Vinit

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First, butget. Second, flexibilities. If you have tight butget, you better choose used SMT equipment instead of the new one. It will save you hundreds of thousand dollar. Second, if you change model more frequently, you do not have many to choose. Fuji, Siemens or Panasonic. Dek & MPM printer are the best in the market. If you need more information about the Refurbished Used SMT equipment with warranty, we are pleased to help you out.

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