Turnkey Manufacturing
We offer the capability to perform turnkey design and manufacture or consignment manufacturing. Provide us with your Bill of Materials and any special instructions and we will purchase the material and assemble your product. |
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| Surface Mount Circuit Level Manufacturing |
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Bare (unpopulated) PCBs are placed into Board Racks and the full rack is placed on a Board Unloader at the start of the automatic assembly line.
Robotic arms automatically transfer the boards one-by-one onto a conveyor that spans the entire length of the assembly line. Often times the individual boards are panelized into an array of PCBs so that several are on the same board as it runs through the automated machinery. They are then separated later in the process. |
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Once unloaded from the rack, the conveyor takes the boards through a screen printing machine. This machine places solder paste onto the boards. A custom stencil that matches the pad layout on the PCB is used. A squeegee loaded with solder paste runs over the stencil, placing the correct amount of material in the appropriate place. The screen printer controls the conveyor to automatically advance to the next board in the line when it is ready. The solder paste melts and becomes solder, securing the components to the PCB once it is run through an oven. |
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Once the solder paste is in place, the boards travel to a Chip pick-and-place machine, known as a "Chipshooter". The chipshooter is a robot that takes reels of tiny resistors and capacitors and places them on the PCB. Solder paste acts as a glue to hold them in place while the boards travel down the assembly line. |
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If everything looks good on the freshly populated board, it is sent through an Infrared (IR) reflow oven. Here the entire board is heated until the solder pasted melts and permanently welds the components to the PCB. This is the only part of the process that needs to be vented, since there are fluxes in the solder paste that evaporate when heated. No special equipment is needed for the exhaust except for an appropriate exhaust cap. |
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EQUIPMENT
Amber Waves, Electronics Division operates a complete in-line surface mount contract manufacturing assembly line in an environmentally controlled environment. Our surface mount equipment can handle fine pitch assembly work, and standard package sizes at high rates of speed to IPC standards. Amber Waves has chosen to use the finest insertion equipment from Fuji.
We also offer complete through-hole and mixed technology service. Amber Waves employs experienced supervisors and inspectors, along with a team of experienced line workers who are enabled with state of the art equipment. |
