And another Desktop PNP.

[mrpackethead]

I know nothing more than what is on this web page.. A kickstarter for a $4000 Machine.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/chipsetter/chipsetter-one-a-desktop-pick-and-place-machine

Looks alright, but meh.. do you really know.

[ebclr]

It's hard to believe this will be founded, have several machines like that on 2500 USD range, with some time on market,and other much better on same range.

[sparkswillfly]

Looks decent: auto nozzle changer, up to 40 removable electric feeders, and enclosed design.  I would be tempted if it was shipping this year.

[rx8pilot]

Everyone wants to make P&P machines it seems. Not sure why. Seems like a terrible business segment where finicky customers are after the cheapest possible solution so margins will be low, BOM count will be high.

Gross.

[ar__systems]

Haha, incidentally I want to make PnP machine too Coming up next year

[ebclr]

I'm on the same boat

[IconicPCB]

I want to make Forbes 500

[harry4516]

looks nice, but these people never have placed boards by themself, or why does it have only 40 feeders.
With only 40 feeders its the same toy like all the other Chinese machines.

[mrpackethead]

In deed.  The only desktop machine approaching sensible feeder numbers for pro typing Is the 90 feeder machine that smallest runs.  It's why I have ditched the concept and am looking at a different solution and bought some last gen factory machines.

[JPortici]

what do you know! david gilmour is part of the team

[langwadt]

maybe it is just me, but how is $140K going to make much of a difference when they are 6 people and want to hire more?

[rx8pilot]

maybe it is just me, but how is $140K going to make much of a difference when they are 6 people and want to hire more?

$140k is a fart in a dust storm relative to the magnitude of the challenge the number of people. Maybe they are all working for free and they have free office space. Maybe they have no idea what they are getting into. Maybe they have no idea that the machines cost a LOT more than the BOM total. The market is small and crowded and jumps to the next lowest price shiny object in an instant.

I don't understand the motivation, but it's fun to watch from far away.

[mrpackethead]

On the face of it, the numbers may not make any sense.   However the flip side of this is that kickstarter is also a very good way of doing a user-survey that actually counts.

You can do a survey of people and ask.. " would you buy this "..   and peole will say "yeah"..  and then you say " ok, whats your card number ".. and the answer is very different.       Kick Starter gets you the answer to will people actually buy this, and really commit to it.

Also kickstarter is just another marketing tool.  Its not all about raising funds..

Would i jump in here.. no.. the DIY project guys are already dijesting this and will borrow any good ideas, and they are making machines (simple slow but they work ) for $1000.

[alan-chipsetter]

Hi Everyone,

harry4516: We feel that 40 tape feeders, plus 2 cut tape trays supporting 5 x 8mm tapes per tray is capable of satisfying the needs for many circuit boards. Feeders can also be changed in and out very quickly as well.

langwadt,rx8pilot: The campaign total is structured to cover the costs of molds and North American certifications. We have margins on our BOM structured to build a sustainable business, and we also have additional funding sources.

The motivation here is to push PNP technologies towards a shorter set up time, and better software experience to make them useful not just for small batch assembly, but for heavy and medium duty prototyping well. This is a hard problem to solve, but we think it’s very important.

This is also being discussed in a separate thread, and on the OpenPnP google group.

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/crowd-funded-projects/chipsetter-one-a-desktop-pick-and-place-machine/msg1036759/#msg1036759


Cheers,
Alan

[harry4516]

Hi Alan,

the campaign says on the website "Assemble your own PCB prototypes, get to market faster."
This sounds not like hobbyists, it sound more like small business. If small business is your target, you will
definitively need more feeders.

I am running a small business and use a TVM802B (46 feeders) extended with 20 cut tape feeders and 14 trays,
and there are still boards where this is not enough.
Not all boards are just a uController and a couple of 1k resistors and 100n Caps.
Just as an example: building high frequency boards need a large number of different capacitors, inductors and others, all with different values.

But if your target users are mainly hobbyists, in this case 40 + 2x5 is fine.

Harry

[mikeselectricstuff]

Hi Alan,

the campaign says on the website "Assemble your own PCB prototypes, get to market faster."
This sounds not like hobbyists, it sound more like small business. If small business is your target, you will
definitively need more feeders.

I am running a small business and use a TVM802B (46 feeders) extended with 20 cut tape feeders and 14 trays,
and there are still boards where this is not enough.
Not all boards are just a uController and a couple of 1k resistors and 100n Caps.
Just as an example: building high frequency boards need a large number of different capacitors, inductors and others, all with different values.

But if your target users are mainly hobbyists, in this case 40 + 2x5 is fine.

Harry

Depends entirely on what sort of stuff you're doing.  I very rarely need more than 20 feeders, and have never needed more than 30

[rx8pilot]

Depends entirely on what sort of stuff you're doing.  I very rarely need more than 20 feeders, and have never needed more than 30

By contrast - I have over 80 feeders and looking to add more, another 20 8mm tape feeders. This is all to support an occasional use scenario of a small business. The reason for all the feeders is so that I can have a number of boards setup at any given moment. Most of what I do is small volumes of a variety of boards. There is a lot of delicate analog circuits, so the number of unique parts is fairly high from what you would need in a pure digital circuit.

I would not mind a machine with far fewer feeders if it could accommodate mixed feeder banks. I could have a bank setup for each board and a 'standard' bank with the parts that are common to all the boards. I have never needed 80+ feeders all at once - just trying to keep the changeover time to be measured by a couple of minutes instead of 2 hours. The feeder banks would need to be able to hold any combination of 8mm-44mm reels along with tube feeders that can handle any size tube lanes. I have about 4-5 different tube sizes but the standard vibe feeders on my machine are 5 lanes of a single size while I need 1 lane each of 5 different sizes. My workflow design is dominated by the need to run 5pcs of PCB-A, then 5pcs of PCB-B, and 5pcs of PCB-C. Sometimes the boards get populated in a custom way - different value passives or leaving the board partially un-populated. Right now, I can run all of them with no setup change which saves a TON of time managing, swapping, configuring, and verifying new setups for each board.

I have no idea how many small businesses can relate.

[mrpackethead]

I have no idea how many small businesses can relate.

I relate entirely.    I looked long and hard at multiple small PNP systems, and just coud'nt see a use-case that fitted my needs.     Almost everythign i build has some switch mode power supplys on it, that means larger numbers of jellybean parts..       And swapping parts over and over just was'nt going to cut it.     In the end, i've got very foruantly and have been able to buy some older Yamaha YV100's and i'm setting up a line that will ahve over 200 parts on it full time.

[rx8pilot]

I relate entirely.    I looked long and hard at multiple small PNP systems, and just coud'nt see a use-case that fitted my needs.     Almost everythign i build has some switch mode power supplys on it, that means larger numbers of jellybean parts..       And swapping parts over and over just was'nt going to cut it.     In the end, i've got very foruantly and have been able to buy some older Yamaha YV100's and i'm setting up a line that will ahve over 200 parts on it full time.

I had considered early on the option of getting 3-4 of the 'desktop' machines to have some flexibility and redundancy. After getting my machine on an eBay fluke - I found that having excellent feeder options and a good up/down/side vision system is really important for low volume high-mix work. The only one out there that see,s like it has business potential is the N4, but from the looks of the software and feeders, I may pull my hair out.

If I was going to design my own machine, it would not look anything like what is on the market today. What I see are machines that are built for speed and cost mega $$ and I see nearly useless 'built to be cheap' machines. Meh.

[mrpackethead]

The only one out there that see,s like it has business potential is the N4, but from the looks of the software and feeders, I may pull my hair out.

I've seen the N4 in person face to face, and the Neoden sales guy took about 90 seconds to convince me that this was NOT a machine i'd even entertain..     

[l0wside]

Could you be a bit more specific?

[l0wside]

The Kickstarter campaign for the Chipsetter is about to run out. The did not fare too bad, 64.000 USD is quite a sum. Still, it did not fund in the end.
Should I have included them in the vaporware section of my overview?

Max

[ebclr]

If this was founded, I will sell empty can's of beer as a quick starter, no sense to pay USD 4000 for experimental kids machine, while several real options are available for less or little more already on production for a while

[janoc]

The Kickstarter campaign for the Chipsetter is about to run out. The did not fare too bad, 64.000 USD is quite a sum. Still, it did not fund in the end.
Should I have included them in the vaporware section of my overview?

Max

Vaporware probably not, some people have actually seen it (Chris Gammel, I believe?). The machine is apparently real. I would rather class it as a "solution looking for a problem" from the business point of view. Hobbyist will not buy this and a professional will not shop on a Kickstarter for an unproven design, when there are several others with similar (or better) performance  for comparable prices on the market already.