Open Placer A New Affordable PCB Assembly Machine

[Kjelt]

Not relevant because this machine targets a totally different market.
If you need high speed, high reliability and full component range choose from the hundreds of professional machines with their very high price.

There are lot of hobbieists and small series prototyping firms where this is good enough and extremely cheap. You need four times the speed? Buy four.

[ar__systems]

I don't see why any hobbyist would need an SMT machine. I mean, they are likely assembling only single copy of their board. The setup and configuring of the machine will take more time than hand assembly.

[rx8pilot]

I agree - the speed is not a factor for the target audience. On my machine - I usually run it at 50% speed or slower because the rest of the process is much slower than the machine itself. Paste, inspection, hand soldering, test, etc, etc....

The rating on my machine is 3600cph if it if perfectly optimized. I never optimize it and run it slow at about 1000cph or so and it is still faster than the pre and post processes in my case.

Reliability is key for me. If it can run for long periods without errors  - I could see it being useful. Sure would be nice if it can do 0402 (or better) all day long.

[rx8pilot]

I don't see why any hobbyist would need an SMT machine. I mean, they are likely assembling only single copy of their board. The setup and configuring of the machine will take more time than hand assembly.

Not sure about pure hobbyists, but the semi-pro and professionals regularly need 4-5 PCB's assembled with a fairly high component count. It could be useful in that role. From experience - it takes a considerable effort to organize the ENTIRE process to make an overall improvement from hand placing. The actual machine placement of  parts is just part of the process. Planning and setup is the bigger part.

[mikeselectricstuff]

I don't see why any hobbyist would need an SMT machine. I mean, they are likely assembling only single copy of their board. The setup and configuring of the machine will take more time than hand assembly.

A hobbyist has no use for a pick/place. Many people who think they want a P&P don't understand enough about it to know any better.
The niche for low-end P&P lies between a few boards hand-assembled and the point where it's viable to subcontract it and/or they need it really fast. This niche probably exists at a size to be a small business for someone, but likely can't be filled with just one machine as people will all have different requirements.
And just forget any idea of doing 0201's Ain't gonna happen on a cheap machine. Anyone who tells you that their machine has enough accuracy to place 0201's doesn't understand that  at this scale, the problems are with picking and feeders.
 

[mikeselectricstuff]

I agree - the speed is not a factor for the target audience. On my machine - I usually run it at 50% speed or slower because the rest of the process is much slower than the machine itself. Paste, inspection, hand soldering, test, etc, etc....

The rating on my machine is 3600cph if it if perfectly optimized. I never optimize it and run it slow at about 1000cph or so and it is still faster than the pre and post processes in my case.

Reliability is key for me. If it can run for long periods without errors  - I could see it being useful. Sure would be nice if it can do 0402 (or better) all day long.

Speed is not a primary consideration but it needs to be at least as fast as hand placing. If the above figures are realistic than that's more than adequate, though at that sort of volume you absolutely need at least the option of a few reel feeders for the higher-quantity parts.

Reliable 0402 all day long is a very tough ask. Don't  think that anything smaller will ever be an option.

[Kjelt]

A hobbyist has no use for a pick/place. Many people who think they want a P&P don't understand enough about it to know any better.

I don't agree Mike. We have a lot of elder hobbieists that are afraid to start with smt because their hands are not surgeon steady anymore or their eyesight has gone bad etc. Etc.

Then I can also state that no hobbieist needs more than one or two good multimeters and power supply.
Look at this forum people have many meters, supplies and state of the art stuff like 7,5 digits pro gear for what? This thing is so cheap it opens the market to start easy with smt for everybody, it lowers the starter barrier and i applaud them for doing so.

But yes a pro P&P is not necessary, and a different league.

[mikeselectricstuff]

A hobbyist has no use for a pick/place. Many people who think they want a P&P don't understand enough about it to know any better.

I don't agree Mike. We have a lot of elder hobbieists that are afraid to start with smt because their hands are not surgeon steady anymore or their eyesight has gone bad etc. Etc.

Those people need magnifiers and/or arm/hand-rests, not automatic pick & place machines.
Nobody needs a P&P machine to populate a board unless it has a lot of parts, as setting it up takes way more time than doing it manually.

[Kjelt]

manually placing is tedious work, esp when there are 50 parts or more per board. A mistake is easily made and when you make a mistake and touch/wipe some already placed parts you sometimes can start all over again.

The setting up should indeed be counted. I think hobbieist could limit their inventory for the designs to 20 different resistors , 10 mlcc caps so those could be setup permanently.

Semi automated p&p machines are not that common and cost more then this machine.

[mikeselectricstuff]

manually placing is tedious work, esp when there are 50 parts or more per board.

Yes but so is setting up a machine.
Most hobbyists will only be doing one or two boards, unless there are a lot of the same part, it will never be quicker to set up than to place manually using a vacuum pen.

A mistake is easily made and when you make a mistake and touch/wipe some already placed parts you sometimes can start all over again.

A machine setup has at least as many ways to mess up. Like placing lots of parts wrong, instead of the odd one or two.

The setting up should indeed be counted. I think hobbieist could limit their inventory for the designs to 20 different resistors , 10 mlcc caps so those could be setup permanently.

that is just not realistic for most people.

[rx8pilot]

Yes but so is setting up a machine.

Setting up a machine is a non-trivial task that is very unforgiving of the smallest mistake. I have spent a HUGE amount of time trying to streamline my setup workflow to reduce the time and mistakes. It still takes a lot of time and there are still mistakes.

A machine setup has at least as many ways to mess up. Like placing lots of parts wrong, instead of the odd one or two.

The faster your machine is, the faster you can make bad boards that end up being a nightmare to unravel.

The setting up should indeed be counted. I think hobbieist could limit their inventory for the designs to 20 different resistors , 10 mlcc caps so those could be setup permanently.

that is just not realistic for most people.

Totally.

[asmi]

If I would have a PnP machine, I would go for a middle ground - automate placing most of parts (things like decoupling caps and pull-up resistors), and then place the rest manually. On my designs usually more than 70% of all parts are these decoupling caps/pullups and similar commonly used parts, so this would save quite some time while avoiding setup overhead. The problem I have is that most (by the count) of my decoupling caps are 0201, and I'm yet to see a machine that can place them while not costing an arm and a leg.

[nisma]

Yes, speed is not all, but it is important too.
For the use as prototyping tool, it is important to know the capability. If you have a board with spartan 6 (1mm bga) and ddr mem ic (60 pin 0.8mm pitch)
it is important to know if the pnp is able to assemble it or not. Same with resistors, if 0402 and 0201 works because for (semi)professional use, if machine
is not capable of placing the important chips, it is the wrong tool.

For the other case, i think tvm801 is better for that case as it allows to assemble more and higher parts.

[1uk3]

Nobody needs a P&P machine to populate a board unless it has a lot of parts, as setting it up takes way more time than doing it manually.

Completely agree.
I do a lot of prototypes and one-offs and it doesn't make sense to use a P&P machine for this. I need one for the things i can't do eg. very dense LED arrays or a board with 100 copies of the same 10 parts. Without reel feeders OpenPlacer doesn't fill my niche 

[rx8pilot]

Nobody needs a P&P machine to populate a board unless it has a lot of parts, as setting it up takes way more time than doing it manually.

Completely agree.
I do a lot of prototypes and one-offs and it doesn't make sense to use a P&P machine for this. I need one for the things i can't do eg. very dense LED arrays or a board with 100 copies of the same 10 parts. Without reel feeders OpenPlacer doesn't fill my niche 

As I have improved my workflow - P&P assembly of one-off prototypes is actually practical. It took a lot of legwork but I am able to setup a new PCB faster than I can manually assemble in most cases. The programming, part numbers, feeders, etc are carefully organized so that while I am waiting for the PCB fab I setup the machine. When the PCB arrives, the machine is 95% ready to go. I will avoid oddball parts like connectors, inductors that are not in the system, etc. Each prototype, I get a little faster. Still does not work for every project - but going in the right direction.

[Furkan]

Dear all

We have conducted some tests with 402 and 201 SMD resistances. The videos and pictures are available at openplacer.com and will soon be available at Indiegogo campaign.

The test is conducted without using the bottom cam.

http://www.openplacer.com/?page_id=66

402 and 201 resistors are placed on tape with our smallest nozzle (0.5 mm inner diameter and 0.8 mm outer diameter) We had announced it as 0.6 mm but it is actually around 0.5 mm +-0.02 mm. It was hard to measure the inner diameter correctly.

We are working on a thinner nozzle with around 0.4 mm inner diameter, but we are not sure that it will be available before the end of the Indiegogo campaign.

I guess 402 users can feel more confident with Open Placer now.

Furkan

[Gary.M]

How complete is the integration of Openpnp with open Placer? Is this complete, or is it a work in progress? Can we see some video of Openpnp running the machine?

[rx8pilot]

If this were my project - I would define the minimum capability as doing 0402 at 99% success rate or better. Then figure out how to make that performance as affordable as possible.

I have assembled two protos in the past week. One of them was nearly all 0805 the other was nearly all 0402 on the passives. The 0805 I just hand assembled because it was so easy. The 0402 PCB, I setup in my P&P because it was actually easier in the end. The benefit of P&P goes up rapidly as component size shrinks and component qty goes up.

It's like buying a cheap car that cannot go fast enough to drive on the expressway, preventing you from going to work and earning the money to pay for the car. It looks like a car and does some of the things a car should do - except it cannot get you to work. That lowers the interest and value dramatically for most.

[mikeselectricstuff]

It looks like the PCB sits on a flat plate. How do you handle double-sided assembly?

[rx8pilot]

It looks like the PCB sits on a flat plate. How do you handle double-sided assembly?

Good eye Mike - that is a critical one.

[ManCave]

Furkan,

Nice work!

May I ask why choose Indiegogo over Kickstarter? Just curious.  ...honest answer would be appreciated.

ManCave

[ManCave]

Thanks!

[Furkan]

For the moment OpenPlacer does not support double sided assembly.

It can be adapted in the future easily because it is very modular. Users can also design their own holders and replace the standard holder if they want.

I guess I missed some discussions; the feeders are machined from Black Delrin. The pictures are macro pictures so every single defect is seen. Those defects should disappear after using it for some time.

I guess the question about Kickstarter vs. Indiegogo is answered.

Furkan

[mikeselectricstuff]

For the moment OpenPlacer does not support double sided assembly.

Omitting such a basic capability, especially one that is so easy to implement, suggests that you don't really understand the needs of the market you are trying to sell into.
The process for double-sided assembly needs no additional equipment ( apart from a second stencil),  all it needs is the ability to mount the PCB in a way that leaves space underneath, which is hardly difficult. 

Low-end pick/place is a small niche market, and every limitation reduces the potential size of that niche.

[Kjelt]

It also needs thermal hardening glue or your parts from the first pass could fall off during the second reflow stage.
In practice I see very few two layer smt used by hobbieists and small startups.
Most use one layer smt combined with TH parts.

I do see it in high density boards having 4 or more layers and that is a different ballgame, 0402 is there standard even 0201 used due to the size constraints.
If someone plays in that league he can also spent over $25k for a more advanced setup.