Reflow Ovens - Experiences with Eurocircuits reflow mate and similar devices

[Laertes]

Hi there,

The company I work for has decided to buy a soldering oven for rapid prototyping. We're looking to spend about $ 6k or something. Among the things I found for semi-professional reflow ovens was the Eurocircuits Reflow Mate. Looks quite reasonable and it's really cheap(in general comparison, almost half my 6k goal), so I wonder if it's any good. Has anyone got one and/or can give me some firsthand experience? Do you get decent process control and results? Can you do medium-sized BGAs(.8mm pitch 484 ball, for example) leaded/lead-free with decent yield?
Does anyone maybe know comparable/better devices? As said, a somewhat higher price would be fine if I can get better performance out of it...

Another note - we've been offered to buy a used/refurbished SMT 200C for less than 6k$, it's a "production grade" machine and I trust the vendor(so I don't expect any nasty surprises performance-wise) but I'm just not sure about the additional cost with such a machine - will it be possible to get a good process feeling(i.e. the necessary temperature settings, timing etc) on such a rather more complex machine as fast as in the other machine? Anyone got one of these in his basement? 

Greetings
Laertes

[Carrington]

Hi!

Only one question: With the Eurocircuits Reflow Mate, how many of the recommended JEDEC curves can you achieve?
Just download eC-reflow-pilot and test by yourself.

JEDEC curves:
http://www.jedec.org/sites/default/files/docs/jstd020d-01.pdf
http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/AppNotes/00233D.pdf]

eC-reflow-pilot:
http://be.eurocircuits.com/shop/offtheshelf/product.aspx?ano=ec-reflow-pilot&ad=8743

[tszaboo]

I would call them and ask which reflow oven do they rebrand. It is quite obvious that they dont make it themselves, maybe they just added some ideas (like the eC compatibility) and look for the OEMs review.
Or visit them on Electronika 2014 I'm sure they bring one there.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Bear in mind that anything "production grade" will be designed for continuous usem and may have signifiicant warmup time and power requirement (e.g. 3-phase)

For prototyping use, a simple toaster oven is fine. Spend the rest of the budget on a  Mantis scope, a decent stencil printer, vacuum pickup, paste dispenser and a few other toys.
 

[Carrington]

Bear in mind that anything "production grade" will be designed for continuous usem and may have signifiicant warmup time and power requirement (e.g. 3-phase)

For prototyping use, a simple toaster oven is fine. Spend the rest of the budget on a  Mantis scope, a decent stencil printer, vacuum pickup, paste dispenser and a few other toys.

Hi Mike.

The truth is, you're absolutely right. 

A simple toaster oven (with a reasonable window) a good PID controller and some DIY, no more.
The price of some of these supposedly professional equipment is ridiculously high, and sometimes are a rubbish.

[marshallh]

http://bearbonessolutions.com/r340a-reflow-oven/

[mikeselectricstuff]

http://bearbonessolutions.com/r340a-reflow-oven/

$1500 for what looks like  a cheap toaster with a controller and fan bolted on - someone is taking the piss...

[Kjelt]

Rediculous indeed. I was fortunate to find this one second hand for around €600. New it was I believe triple that. After reprogramming it ( the original PID curve sucked) it is pretty good. But even this one has hot spots right under the IR radiators.
http://www.torch.cc/en/product/T100.html

[tszaboo]

Bear in mind that anything "production grade" will be designed for continuous usem and may have signifiicant warmup time and power requirement (e.g. 3-phase)

For prototyping use, a simple toaster oven is fine. Spend the rest of the budget on a  Mantis scope, a decent stencil printer, vacuum pickup, paste dispenser and a few other toys.

If it is for work, I dont see how the hacked toaster ovens even enter the competition. I mean you need something which works out of the box, and you can put in the working area and use without anyone lathing at you. Also, you are pretty much spending someone else's money, and you dont decide that you would rather like some other tools because you saved money.

[rx8pilot]

I skipped the toaster oven because it is how I make a living. I got a used JEM-310 batch oven for about $3k US which is nice. 5 zones, convection, large top window, 99 profiles, big LCD, etc... It is really solid. I have used it for both lead and lead-free. It gets used for prototypes and pilot runs with fine pitch mixed with heavy inductors so having careful control and even heat is important. There is no warm-up period on a batch oven and the zones are time/temp so it is easy to get the profile you want. The graphic display shows actual temp profile which makes it a little easier. The temps are measured at the hot air exits at the front and back so they read higher than area with PCB. I put a thermocouple in through the nitrogen port to understand the difference. Once I got a few profiles setup, I have not messed with it in a long time. It is very rare to have any re-flow issues. The only time I have had any issues was from using OLD paste on some proto boards but that is not the oven.

For professional work, the toaster ovens should be in the break room where we keep ours. Re-flow soldering really needs tight process control.

The newer models are around $7k new.

[Precipice]

I mean you need something which works out of the box,

Ho ho ho. There's at least as much tuning involved in a linear oven as there is in a toaster oven, but there's a massive warmup time too.
They're great when you're doing a big production run and can tweak the process over a few boards, but it's far from fire & forget. (For that, vapour phase seems to be the way, and they're not crazy-expensive unless you want an in-line one).

As it happens, I've got the same batch oven as rx8pilot (well, its predecessor). It's not bad at all, and makes good boards - but I _know_ I'm stepping outside profiles sometimes, getting the slowest bits of the boards up to temperature pushes the fast bits too hot. No harm is done (it seems), but I'm not completely happy, especially on big panels of boards.
At least the big window lets me watch (and worry!), and thermocouples taped to the PCB give me some reasonably truthful numbers (the oven measures air temperature...)
Homebuilt vapour phase lurches ever closer. Next break I get (probably new year), I'll be attaching this here pile of Melexis 16x4 IR sensors to my PID controller, to see if I can deliver an acceptable ramp profile.

[Laertes]

Thanks for the responses!

Hi!

Only one question: With the Eurocircuits Reflow Mate, how many of the recommended JEDEC curves can you achieve?
Just download eC-reflow-pilot and test by yourself.

JEDEC curves:
http://www.jedec.org/sites/default/files/docs/jstd020d-01.pdf
http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/AppNotes/00233D.pdf]

eC-reflow-pilot:
http://be.eurocircuits.com/shop/offtheshelf/product.aspx?ano=ec-reflow-pilot&ad=8743

Good idea. I did that and according to their software, they support the full 3°C/sec heat-up. Cooling seems a lot less controlled, the predefined profiles appartenly just ask you to open the door to cool off at about those 6°C per second. I'm not sure what to think of that. Also, I'm not sure if the device will actually match these specs, and match them evenly over the entire board area...

I would call them and ask which reflow oven do they rebrand. It is quite obvious that they dont make it themselves, maybe they just added some ideas (like the eC compatibility) and look for the OEMs review.
Or visit them on Electronika 2014 I'm sure they bring one there.

Yeah I'll be there(I work in Munich, so I'm there every year anyway) but I'd like to get a review from somebody not working for their sales department

Bear in mind that anything "production grade" will be designed for continuous usem and may have signifiicant warmup time and power requirement (e.g. 3-phase)

For prototyping use, a simple toaster oven is fine. Spend the rest of the budget on a  Mantis scope, a decent stencil printer, vacuum pickup, paste dispenser and a few other toys.

If it is for work, I dont see how the hacked toaster ovens even enter the competition. I mean you need something which works out of the box, and you can put in the working area and use without anyone lathing at you. Also, you are pretty much spending someone else's money, and you dont decide that you would rather like some other tools because you saved money.

Yeah, toaster ovens are out of the question.
We have professional hand-soldering tools here, we do EASA-certified avionics hardware rework. But these guys are over their heads in work and can't do assembly for our prototypes and they don't have equipment for BGAs at all.

hmmm nice thread. i will be interested to know more about reflow ovens. the 2nd post about JEDEC curves ... are they absolutely critical? if say an oven is partly malfunction, how can it tell you it is NOT following a curve correctly? i dont suppose it has a post flow job print out of the curve? but by then, the process is already done and the batch is subject to a wrong curve ... (apologies if i ask too many things, and i can understand how some sensitive component cannot sustain too fast a temp change)

Actually, it has a post-flow print out, including a print from an external sensor you can put right on the board.

I mean you need something which works out of the box,

Ho ho ho. There's at least as much tuning involved in a linear oven as there is in a toaster oven, but there's a massive warmup time too.
They're great when you're doing a big production run and can tweak the process over a few boards, but it's far from fire & forget. (For that, vapour phase seems to be the way, and they're not crazy-expensive unless you want an in-line one).

As it happens, I've got the same batch oven as rx8pilot (well, its predecessor). It's not bad at all, and makes good boards - but I _know_ I'm stepping outside profiles sometimes, getting the slowest bits of the boards up to temperature pushes the fast bits too hot. No harm is done (it seems), but I'm not completely happy, especially on big panels of boards.
At least the big window lets me watch (and worry!), and thermocouples taped to the PCB give me some reasonably truthful numbers (the oven measures air temperature...)
Homebuilt vapour phase lurches ever closer. Next break I get (probably new year), I'll be attaching this here pile of Melexis 16x4 IR sensors to my PID controller, to see if I can deliver an acceptable ramp profile.

THAT's the answer I wanted to get most(well, I don't like it but that's the info I needed), sorry if the question didn't lead up to that enough.
So vapour phase sounds like the best thing after all... but these are somewhat expensive... the same vendor offering the SMT 200C offered a used vapour phase system for 8000$...perhaps I should convince management to spend a little more.

[Carrington]

After the above:

   I think that the 'Eurocircuits Reflow Matte' will not reach your level of requirement.

   And even if a simple oven can reach this level, after a tuning of course, I'm afraid that it would not be appropriate (even if it is only used for prototyping).

   A second hand professional oven would be suitable?