The latest Mycronic technology for 2015 and beyond.

Gemini Tec have now fully integrated a new SMT production line, adding of two MY200 placement machines, along with the UKs first MY600 jet printer, more reflow capability comes with a BTU 7-zone reflow oven and complimented with fully automated board loading, handling and transportation.

2014 has seen a major rise in new customer orders at Gemini Tec, leading us to expand our SMT capability and capacity. At the centre of our SMT operation we have now fully commissioned two further Mycronic SMT placement machines, along with more solder jet printing technology, providing a substantial increase in capacity.

New SMT Synergy line for high mix and complex PCB assembly:

Our latest Synergy line includes two large format SMT placement machines, able to accept over 350 part types in one set up, perfect for high mix products with quick changeover. With such large feeder capacity we can produce demanding high mix product types. The Synergy advantage means we can use two SMT machines simultaneously or even individually. Offline planning software calculates the optimum method to build any given assembly, driving the department efficiency high, at all times.

World renown reflow with a new BTU Pyramax oven, with 7 zones has been added, offering fully automatic line assembly for our customers surface mount products and PCBs.


New solder jet printing capability. 

The USP of our service is based around solder jet printing and again Gemini are the first UK CEM to invest in the latest model of solder jet printers from Mycronic, the MY600.

The latest printer provides perfect solder paste application,  to the same exacting standards as our current MY500 jet printer and with a huge boost to paste write speeds, of upto 50%. This major speed gain allows us to produce boards faster and meet lower price points, when batch sizes increase.


More Agilis feeders.
Additional investment of over 100K has been made in more Mycronic Agilis feeders. Using Agilis feeders allows us to rationalise material consumption, providing valuable savings to customers. Agilis feeders allow us to enjoy super fast set up times, for every order produced and ensures short changeover times. This capability is imperative in maintaining the UKs fastest delivery service for technology boards.

Additional line automation.
In keeping with our ongoing strategy for efficiency, we have also added a full range of Nutek and Mycronic board loading equipment. From automatic conveyors to feed the PCBs through the entire SMT process, along in-line inspection and into oven reflow, before being automatically unloaded, ready for the next production operation.

Can we help you?
As we enter 2015 and beyond, Gemini Tec now have more capacity to engage with new customers. If you are involved in sub-contract manufacture of SMT and complex SMT hardware, we can provide a new level of technical advantages with solder jet printing capability. 

With a long established reputation, Gemini provide a friendly and professional level of service that can be tailored to meet a wide range of unique requirements.

All the products we build are made ethically in the UK, with care and attention. Gemini do not offer a low cost overseas manufacturing option, instead deciding to retain complete control of product quality, delivery and sensitive IP in the UK.

Our entire CEM operation is located at our superbly equipped and ESD controlled facility in Hampshire. If you would like to know more about the services we can provide to you and establish a potential business fit, please contact Adam Harsant in the first instance.

Gemini Tec Ltd

1 The Brook Trading Estate

Deadbrook Lane

Aldershot

Hampshire

GU12 4XU

United Kingdom

+44 (0) 1252 333 444

www.geminitec.co.uk

Solder paste typography for PCB's with BGA and leadless devices. How to avoid solder paste defects on SMT boards.

Here we look the many issues surrounding production faults of PCB assemblies during the SMT assembly process, and how best to avoid them.

If you are involved in the procurement or quality aspect of PCBA manufacturing, you'll of already seen a wide variety of solder defects and problems over the years. In fact, when you goggle 'solder paste defects' you'll be greeted with a wide range of forums, blogs, statistics and solutions for controlling the paste application process. 

Even with a top of the range stencil printer, along with all if its related cleaning and handling equipment comes a complicated set of rules to ensure that paste application is correct. At Gemini we use a completely different technology called solder jet printing. We are among a number of global based companies who are now adopting this process, to remove the many constraints of traditional stencils. In fact companies such as GE, Thales and BAE have chosen to adopt solder jet printing.

If you've previously had a problem with floating  QFN devices, or poor connections on BGA devices, its typically due to the volume of paste during the SMT process. Traditional stencils have a physical limit, for the distance between devices and the Z height.

Here we can see the the reasons why stencils have reached the limit of capability for high mix technology PCB assemblies. Stepped stencils that can cater for demanding PCB boards designs require a new set of design rules to be used. This is not the case with solder jet printing, due to the ability to land solder paste on any device, and pad at any size.

Here we have a picture of a typical QFN deposit, made with a solder jet printer.
 

As you can see the paste typography is unlike a stencil deposit, and is created with a unique construction for each pad type. With QFNs, the issue of floating after reflow is thus removed. The native paste deposit caters for the spread of paste. And even with stitching vias inside the pad, paste can be applied to fill the via holes, and avoid solder drain. Standard resistors and capacitors have a small deposit inside the heel to avoid tomb stoning during reflow. The dot is around 0.3 mm wide - a size that cant be pasted with repeatability with stencils, as the aperture hole gets blocked up)

When a PCB is reflowed the parts on the board required less remedial work to ensure they comply with IPC standards. Reworking complex parts can often lead to joint integrity problems or damaged devices, so being able to reflow first time is of course the optimum position for any CEM involved with SMT Assembly.

Fist pass rates at AOI (automated optical inspection) are much higher when the solder fillets and joints are correct. False calls are eliminated, when every joint on each board follows a uniform and consistent typography. Less re-work leads to a lower hidden costs for manufactures, that ultimately can be removed from the cost of manufacture.

 

Solder jet printing improves yields and reliability and drives out the out the hidden cost of PCB assembly. For complex PCB and SMT assembly nothing can rival the capability of jet printing.

Gemini Tec use 2 world-class jet printers for all its SMT assembly. Ensuring that we can avoids the common issues found with solder paste application using traditional stencils. Both jet printers provide a full AOI to paste deposits before placement to ensure do deviation on such a critical stage of the SMT assembly process.

In this video we can see within the MY600 jet printer. Filmed in slow motion, the advanced DSP electronics moves the head, with over 3g force, shooting solder paste deposits onto the PCB, through its unique ejector head. Small red lights are just visible showing the AOI process.
 

Here is a example of the latest XILINX Kintex-7 devices, being mounted to a production board built at Gemini during November 2014. Over 1000 solder connections on the FPGA, with the added complication of a mixture of devices that need differing paste volumes.

Complex PCB assembly with XILINX FPGA devices at Gemini Tec Ltd

If you would like to see more about jet printing and how its used to build complex SMT products, contact us at Gemini Tec for more help.

Resources:
A link to our supplier of jet printers and SMT placement equipment.
http://www.mycronic.com/

More details on our services. 
http://www.geminitec.co.uk/smt-production-service

Gemini Tec Ltd

1 The Brook Trading Estate

Deadbrook Lane

Aldershot

Hampshire

GU12 4XU

United Kingdom

+44 (0) 1252 333 444

www.geminitec.co.uk

Embedded Design Show 2014 - Press Release

Embedded Design Show - Press Release

Stand H30

Gemini Tec Ltd will once again be exhibiting at the Electronics and Embedded Design show in 2014, to talk about more leading edge technology being used for rapid and complex PCB hardware manufacturing.

The company has recently installed the UK’s first MY600 solder jet printer and is currently the only UK CEM operating with two Mycronic solder jet printers, enabling it to provide exceptionally high throughput for SMT boards that incorporate challenging components.

This latest investment brings extra production capacity to meet the needs of new customers who are designing PCB hardware using the latest array of components. Solder jet paste printing technology removes the limitations of screen printing with traditional stencils and delivers new levels of quality and reliability for flexible substrates, board cavities, package-on-package, QFNs and new components with small process windows.

One of the major advantages with the latest MY600 platform is the ability to increase paste printing speeds by up to 50%, allowing Gemini Tec to increase its ability to support higher volume orders to the same exacting standards as its current MY500 jet printer.

To ensure Gemini Tec can exceed the requirements of new customers, additional investment has been made into new placement and reflow equipment. A new fully automated SMT line with the latest MY200SX14 and MY200LX14 machines from Mycronic, provides more high mix SMT capability with a 40,000 components per hour capability. 

In its 37^th year, Gemini Tec provide rapid delivery prototypes and production orders for batch sizes of 1 to 1000 units. A full turnkey service includes a dedicated PCB Altium PCB layout service and contract manufacturing service, all conducted from its secure Hampshire based facility.  

Gemini Tec will be on stand H30, joined by its long-standing partner DSL, who provide hardware design services to the embedded computing market. Rory Dear of DSL will be on the stand to talk about their collaborative ‘Functional Building Block’ design approach, where we make the investment in designing and building an all-encompassing platform and our customers select the required ‘functional building blocks’ which are then transplanted into a preferred form factor – greatly reducing cost, risk and time to market.

Gemini Tec Ltd

1 The Brook Trading Estate

Deadbrook Lane

Aldershot

Hampshire

GU12 4XU

United Kingdom

+44 (0) 1252 333 444

www.geminitec.co.uk

DSL Ltd

Aylesford Court

Works Road

Letchworth Garden City

Hertfordshire

SG6 1LP

United Kingdom

+44 (0) 1462 675530

www.dsl-ltd.co.uk

Surface mount machine upgrades - first phase now complete...

Fully automated SMT line, including solder jet printing at Gemini Tec Ltd

The first phase of our SMT  upgrade has been completed this week. 2014 will see a major investment program to increase capacity and efficiency within the SMT production area.

With many new customer wins and increasing volumes of SMT assemblies from our loyal customer base, August sees the completion of the first phase. We have now installed our MY500 solder jet printer in-line with our MYCRONIC MY100 Synergy line, and added extra speed functionality to the placement lines, added additional Agilis feeders.

Blank boards are loaded via our Nutek loaders, along a conveyor into the MY500 solder jet printer. The solder jet printer places small dots of paste to make up the exact volume required, without the need to use a stencil. The process is quick, accurate and checked with on board cameras.

The solder jet printing really helps eliminate the problems with traditional screen printers, such as over paste, leading to shorts or blocked stencil aperture's which left open circuits. If you type 'solder paste defects' into goggle, you'll discover a high number of examples of this common problem.

Using stencils created us alot of solder paste defects, resulting in excessive SMT re-work. The effect of too many solder defects added a significant cost to the PCB assembly process - that ultimately needs to be recovered, setting aside the production delays and onward impact to customer's. Thankfully we are able to use solder jet printing to avoid such problems.

The boards are then run along more conveyors into the first SMT machine, where a selection of component parts are placed with 8 fast placement heads. Clever software works out which components should be loaded. to each machine in the Synergy line to balance the run time, thus by using 2 SMT machines simultaneously, we can half the placement time per board.When we are running NPI and prototype boards, we are able to use each machine as a stand alone placement machine, each building a different customer order.. very clever.

Both machines have electrical verification on-board, this has proved to be very useful when parts are supplied incorrectly, or if the wrong component value is ever presented to the machine, this avoids putting incorrect resistors and capacitors on to the board.

Once all the parts are machine placed, the boards then travel to a inspection conveyor, at this point we are able to add on any SMT parts. This is useful when building 1 or 2 offs, as we do not need to buy reels, tapes or take on large MOQ's etc.

The conveyor takes the PCBs directly into the oven. Our MYCRONIC Synergy 100 line uses a BTU VIP98, with 7 reflow zones. 7 zones allows us to create an accurate thermal profile, for any PCB, regardless of the types of components on board. We spend time engineering a profile for each board, using our knowledge and slim-kic technology.

The boards are automatically unloaded back onto a Nutek de-stacker, and can wait until cooled. The boards are then transferred into our AOI department for 100% inspection. Including 3D X-ray and ERSA camera inspection. This allows us to confirm our process is correct and detect any issues that may need further investigation. Our combination of solder jet printing, placement and reflow ensure the minimal amount of errors.

The process of how we get blank boards to fully populated assemblies is highly important for a contract manufacture to provide customers with high yield products and quick deliveries.We invested in MYRONIC technology, for its speed of set up and accuracy. The solder jet printing technology in amongst the best technologies available in the world.

We have been asked many times, 'why doesn't everyone have solder jet printing?'

The answer to this question has many points. Initially the investment deters traditional CEM's, who make higher volume or less product mix with more simple types of PCB assemblies. Gemini can produce complex boards, in low to medium volume.

Before the days of solder jet printing Gemini would order over 700 stencil's a year (due the the mix of assembly orders) so this made a substantial cost contribution, which has also been passed back to our customer's.

Managing the stencil process from procurements to storage and cleaning, added hidden costs. The quality problems that had risen from stencil printing often led to high amounts of re-work and un-happy customers! Gemini aim for a lean approach to its CEM business which helps optimise its costs to customer's.

Gemini Tec are among a range of leading suppliers in Europe, who have invested into solder jet printing to avoid traditional solder defects and gain many technical advantages, Companies who have also invested include Thales, Halin BV, Netherlands, Appel-Elektronik GmbH, Germany and Page (Belgium) to name a few.

UK & European customers can all benefit from rapid prototype to small and medium volume production with solder jet printing, which provides higher quality products at optimised prices points.

Next month we install the UK's first MY600 solder jet printer and new MY200 SX Synergy line, so more news to follow.

If you wish to know more about us, click our website or get in touch with us by phone.

http://www.geminitec.co.uk

Gemini Tec Ltd

1 The Brook Trading Estate

Deadbrook Lane

Aldershot

Hampshire

GU12 4XU

Tel: +44 (0) 1252 333 444

The first UK CEM to invest in MYDATA's new range of high volume solder jet printers.

The first UK CEM to invest in MYCRONIC's new range of high volume solder jet printers.

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A second solder jet printer has now been ordered for our surface mount facility in Aldershot Hampshire, with installation in August 14.

MY600 High Speed Jet Printer arriving August 14

....way back in 2008 Gemini Tec were the first UK based CEM to invest into solder jet printing technology, and now we are the first UK CEM to introduce the latest edition of printers, the MY600. 

MYCRONIC's MY600 is the next generation of solder jet printers and has been designed to suit higher volume surface mount assembly applications.
This next-generation Jet Printer now enables Gemini to achieve optimal solder joints with a 50% increase in throughput, against our current jet printer.  The introduction of this high-performance platform will allow new production capacity for customers who are struggling to mount difficult components using classic screen printers.

With the increasing demand for higher volume applications from its customer base, the MY600 overcomes many of the speed limitations, and still provides optimal assembly for flexible substrates, board cavities, package-on-package, QFNs and new components with small process windows.

The use of  solder jet printing has transformed the experiences for all our customers and allowed us to achieve new levels of rapid PCB assembly.  The new MY600 will be used to support higher volume orders and contracts on the same basis.

The new MY600 solder jet printer will operate with its own MYCRONIC 'Synergy' SMT line, comprising of two high speed SMT placement machines, a BTU convection reflow oven and Nutek fully automatic board handling systems.

Company Director Adam Harsant, comments on the latest solder jet printing news.

"This latest investment is an exciting new chapter in the development of our business, we are expanding our entire SMT operation on the back of the demand for high quality and UK manufactured hardware"

"Our customers appreciate the value this technology has provided and we are investing to ensure that we have sufficient capacity for the increase in demand. And with a continued shift from sourcing in 'perceived' low cost centres back towards the UK, we recognise the opportunity to now support higher volume orders with all the advantages that solder jet printing technology provides"

If you would like to know more about how this technology has helped our customers, or discuss a technical demonstration at our facility, please get in touch..

http://www.geminitec.co.uk

Gemini Tec Ltd

1 The Brook Trading Estate

Deadbrook Lane

Aldershot

Hampshire

GU12 4XU

Tel: +44 (0) 1252 333 444

Thanks to DSL, for providing the right industrial PC...

Blog Foreword:

Gemini work closely with DSL, who provide industrial PC's and design and support custom embedded PC's and solutions for a variety of markets. When we needed a technical solution it made complete sense to talk to the experts in this field. We knew we could trust DSL to deliver the right solution and product to enhance our IT requirements for our new MRP system. 

 

Manufacturing Management with Panel PCs

 

DSL were approached by Gemini Tec, a high complexity and fast turnaround CEMS who DSL regularly utilise – so the remit was mutually beneficial.

 

Client Objectives

Our client wished to computerise their production management, achieving the benefits most relevant to them detailed in our recent analysis of what can be achieved.

1. Simplify process and improve accuracy of task clocking in/out times and accessing ERP manufacturing software.
2. Supporting barcode scanners to automatically log production tasks via route cards
3. Locally view work instructions and drawings for manufacturing tasks and deliver messages to operators.
4. Restrict employees undertaking work they are not trained or assigned to complete
5. Using this data, analysing where efficiency improvements can be made.
6. Subsequently, analyse the effect of said efficiency improvements to derive their relative worth.
7. Understand overall efficiency of the migration itself (thus it’s own ROI) and those further improvements it has helped to monitor.
8. A solution that matched the mechanical constraints on site.

The key driver of this concept is of course to improve efficiency for client’s benefit, in terms of cost, yield and speed of manufacture – to increase competitive advantage.

 

Solution 

Based on Gemini Tec’s hardware requirements definition and budgets, DSL identified and supplied a proven industrial Panel PC platform that met their needs in its entirety – the PMX-090T

DSL identified the most appropriate Operating System (WES 2009) and created a pre-installed image which contained the components necessary to achieve GeminiTec’s requirement.
GeminiTec developed the integration software that drove the objectives listed above and finalised the platform such that it was fit for purpose.
Both DSL and Gemini Tec adhere rigidly to the standards set out by ISO 9001:2008 and the continual drive for improvements the standard dictates were driven forwards by this implementation.

 

A word from the happy client…

“DSL’s industrially suited and reliable hardware, combined with our own in house ERP manufacturing software have provided us a solid solution that has not only enabled us to monitor our manufacturing efficiency, but has made contributions itself” – Adam Harsant of Gemini Tec

Embedding the World Cup with goal-line technology

For years, international football association FIFA have heavily resisted technology's influence in soccer, almost comically arguing that bad refereeing decisions are all part of the excitement of the game. FIFA president Sepp Blatter has described goal-line technology as "only 95 percent accurate", though even that level of accuracy – when compared to a human eye, often tens of metres away – is surely a vast improvement?

For technologists, even if this disputable 95 percent figure was to be believed, bridging that 5 percent gap was never a sizeable task. Though in 2008 following that statement, the FIFA president put the implementation of such technology on ice – permanently.

Predictably, subsequently further controversial decisions ensued, though in relatively low-key matches not on the international stage, and in March 2010 an election was held between eight of the founding bodies of soccer – voting 6-2 in favor of permanently ditching the technology, the two dissenters being England and Scotland.

In June that year at the 2010 FIFA World Cup the tide was about to turn, when hundreds of millions of fans across 241 separate countries saw England's Frank Lampard score a goal – the ball clearly over a metre across the line – against Germany, which was disallowed due to human error by the referee. Scoring or missing was a turning point in the 2-1 game, which ended as a 4-1 loss for England. The entire country, quickly followed by immense global support (perhaps bar Germany!), put huge pressure on FIFA, and shortly after Blatter announced that the goal-line technology consideration would be re-opened.

The tech contenders

In 2011 FIFA began internal trials with 10 companies' goal-line technology systems, and by 2012 they whittled this down to two potential candidates: Goal Ref, utilizing a passive "chip-in-ball" and a magnetic field to detect its whereabouts; and Hawk-Eye, utilizing a series of high-resolution cameras and triangulation algorithms.

Both have a very high, though interestingly unpublished, accuracy percentage, but neither could claim 100 percent accuracy as both are fallible to some degree.

A technology based on electromagnetic fields, which is being used at the 2014 World Cup, would be susceptible to interference, though unlikely in the environment; an unscrupulous party could theoretically interfere with its accuracy.

The high-speed-camera-based system, you could argue, is less vulnerable to outside interference, though is reliant on installation accuracy and calibration, having rigorously proven the calculations used to derive the decision.

Additionally, in the 2014 World Cup referees are wearing smartwatches as part of a GoalControl-4D system to alert them to goal-line technology cameras detecting goals. So far in the competition goal-line technology has already caused a share of confusion and controversy in the match between France and Honduras. This wasn't a case of the technology malfunctioning, but the public weren't prepared that the GoalControl system would also show instances where a goal was not scored before the instance where a goal was scored if the ball almost crossed the line multiple times.

Both systems also can't consider the change in shape of a ball when it bounces, for example. The Hawk-Eye system, prior to soccer, has long been employed in snooker (similar to billiards), cricket, and tennis. Bounce distortion in soccer, given we're concerned with it passing a line, not falling short of it, isn't relevant – in tennis however this can be contentious; during the 2008 Wimbledon final, a ball that appeared out was cited as "in" by Hawk-Eye by a single millimeter.

Interestingly, despite no percentage claims of accuracy of the technology, a 3.6 mm error margin is advertised by Hawk-Eye. Whilst this seems minute, it's easy to see why the technology claiming it's "in" by 1 mm becomes disputable. Cricket saw a similar point of contention in 2012, where a Leg Before Wicket (LBW) foul was called despite it visually appearing the ball would have sailed over the stumps, which would negate the call.

Soccer has attempted to address the shortfalls of the technology – well, more the opportunity for it to be disputed – by moving away from the "video replay" style of the other implementations completely with the use of a 3D reproduction of the controversial incident.

Whilst this has the advantage of giving an "undisputable" decision, people are naturally wary of any visual that disagrees with what they "saw" with their own eyes – though optical illusions and magic tricks should easily counter how fallible the human eye is to misinterpretation.

Future uses

The sporting world is truly opening up to the embedded computing industry and is more accepting of new technologies than ever before. Last month I discussed the increasing sports medicine usage of embedded; now I'm sure I've got you thinking about how embedded technology could improve your own favorite sport. Perhaps lasers displaying shot distances and speeds on the pitch, intelligent sporting equipment visually flagging illegal usage – the possibilities are endless!

For more information, contact Rory at rdear@opensystemsmedia.com.