Overview
Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) are used in virtually every electronic device today, from cellular phones and personal computers to industrial and medical machinery. The size of a PCB can range from a coin to as big as a TV to fit all the applications that requires electrical circuits. The PCB manufacturers are requested to have the ability to effectively produce different kinds of PCB with certain quality, which allows them to meet increasing demands for PCB and the variety of PCB size and shape.
Soldering becomes more and more essential to the process of PCB creation since the parts on the PCB are getting smaller, which implies larger possibilities of failure. Besides, the part placement on the PCB is also easy to get wrong. The conventional way to inspect these manufacturing failures (bad soldering and wrong placement) is to use an independent machine for 2D optical inspection, which results in longer communication time between computer and the vision machine. To save costs, increase reliability, and speed up the inspection process, they turn to seek solution that only contains 1 machine to handle motion control and optical inspection.
Application
System Requirements
In the past, PCB manufacturers used inspection systems that were composed of 2 expensive machines, one for machine vision and the other for machine control. And mostly this system was only capable of 2D solder inspection, which is insufficient in judging the corners &angles of the part placement and thus causes faulted PCBs and some potential short-circuits not being able to be discovered. To mitigate this, a new system is desired, with the following requirements:
- 1 machine that handles both machine visionand motion control
- 3D solder inspection capabilities
- Short processing time for mass production
- High inspection accuracy and high-speed motion control
System Description
In this application, the host PC (UNO-3072L) deals with not only the motor control for position control, but also the optical inspection of the soldering. Without the need of communication between machines, the process control can react upon the result of optical inspection immediately.
Advantech's PCI-1240U was chosen for high-speed motion controls, including precise positioning, trajectory pre-loading and position comparing function. Besides, its general-purpose Digital I/O onboard gets the feedback of sensors to make sure a precise process control. PCI-1720U AO card is adopted to adjust the level of the lighting, which makes the inspection flexible for all spots on the PCB board.
Conclusion
By combining Advantech's PCI-1240U and PCI-1720U cards in UNO-3072L, a compact, high-performance, highly reliable, and cost-effective solution was found. The customer now had 1 machine that controlled machine vision and motion control together, with 3D solder inspection capabilities.
The system provided 20% more throughput while saving on overall costs compared to customer's old solution. The 3D soldering ability and the adjustable lighting system helps the factories provide better manufacturing with strong capabilities for PCB soldering.
Product
SCADA/HMI Software
Control Drivers
Embedded Automation Computers
 |
UNO-3072L |
|
|
|
Intel® Celeron® M UNO with 2 x PCI Slots
|
|
Centralized Motion Control Cards
 |
PCI-1240U |
|
|
|
4-axis Stepping and Servo Motor Control Universal PCI Card
|
|
Data Acquisition Cards
 |
PCI-1720U |
|
|
|
12-bit, 4-ch Isolated Analog Output Universal PCI Card
|
|
Industrial Monitors
 |
FPM-3120G |
|
|
|
Industrial 12.1" SVGA Flat panel Monitor
|
|