We began planning for the end of the last recession before there was a visible resurgence in demand,” David Weston says. “We anticipated a need for advanced technologies that require a quantum leap in terms of capability, and moved to establish a strong position to win those types of contracts.” Some of the new technologies now in demand include advanced power packages such as Land Grid Array (LGA), which is difficult to solder and impossible to inspect using conventional optical technology.
Another project, involving a smartphone handset design for high-volume offshore assembly, requires accurate placement of a chip featuring I/Os at 0.2 mm pitch. Weston tells more: “This was our first project involving this type of package. The geometry is challenging, and we are sharing our knowledge of the best way to lay out PCB pads with our customer to help ensure maximum throughput and yield when mounting the chips in a production scenario.”
Advanced capabilities are critical to Interconics’ ability to deliver this level of support for customers. These include world leaders in sectors such as advanced instrumentation, scientific research, F1 racing, automotive, and advanced telecom including 5G mobile. The company began its association with Yamaha Motor IM in 2013, after visiting the SMT/Hybrid Expo in Nuremberg to discuss the options on offer from a number of potential suppliers. “Yamaha was able to offer the advanced accuracy, repeatability and throughput we needed, particularly for placement and inspection, as well as flexible terms including risk-free purchase and an 8-year guarantee that gives us control of our ownership costs,” explains Weston.
Interconics placed an initial order for Yamaha’s YS12 and YS12F mounters and a YSi-12 hybrid optical inspection station with integrated laser-based height and coplanarity checking for enhanced quality assurance. The cooperation moved into a higher gear in early 2014 when Interconics took delivery of the first Yamaha YSi-X 3D X-ray inspection machine to arrive in Europe. The YSi-X has become central to Interconics’ ability to develop processes for package technologies such as LGA. The low standoff height and large solder pads on the underside of the LGA, and similar packages such as QFN, mean solder joints are vulnerable to voiding. Process control has to be spot on to keep voids within acceptable limits, and reliable data is needed to help establish suitable settings. However, manual or automated optical inspection is impossible. The system, which uses advanced laminography to build an accurate 3D cross section through each joint, gives Interconics’ engineers all the data they need to optimise the soldering process and verify that all joints are acceptable.
“Yamaha provided great engineering support on-site to help us get the best from the YSi-X and use the information captured to improve our processes,” adds Weston. “We were each pushing the boundaries, to discover the full potential of Yamaha’s new X-ray technology, and we learned a lot together. We saw that here was a partner we could rely on to help us achieve our goal to perfect the most advanced capabilities in the marketplace and deliver the most complex products within the fastest turnaround times.”
“Yamaha provided great engineering support on-site to help us get the best from the YSi-X and use the information captured to improve our processes,” adds Weston. “We were each pushing the boundaries, to discover the full potential of Yamaha’s new X-ray technology, and we learned a lot together. We saw that here was a partner we could rely on to help us achieve our goal to perfect the most advanced capabilities in the marketplace and deliver the most complex products within the fastest turnaround times.”
Continued successful collaboration throughout 2014 saw Interconics extend its investment to a YSP high-accuracy multi-function screen printer and record another first in Europe by installing two of Yamaha’s latest YSM20 high-efficiency modular mounters.
“The YSP is the only printer I know that can automatically adjust the squeegee angle, which is essential to control the print process at the very high resolutions we need,” says Weston. He also mentions the printer’s built-in inspection, using a dedicated camera, which verifies the quality of every print and feeds back the results to help optimise stencil cleaning and manage processes such as automated overlay printing. “I’ll admit I was very set in my ways as far as paste printing is concerned, but the YSP has helped us take process control and throughput to a significantly higher level,” he adds. “We needed this, to keep pushing forward.”
The YSM20 is the fastest mounter in its class. Yamaha’s “one-head solution” concept allows the machine to handle a wide range of components from ultra-small 03015 (0.3 mm x 0.15 mm) chip-size devices to large components with the utmost efficiency. With pickup orientation and tilt status detection also built in, as well as nozzle self-diagnosis, the YSM20 ensures consistently high mounting quality and reliability. “The YSM20s answer our need to deal with the Bill Of Materials (BOMs) for extremely complex products, which contain large numbers of small parts,” continues Weston. “If demand from customers continues to increase, we can add extra modules to the YSM20s to further boost capacity and throughput.”
All machines in Interconics’ complete Yamaha SMT-line solution, which extends from the printer through to inspection, operate on a common software platform. This allows the machines to interact seamlessly and efficiently, and saves laborious manual programming. Weston says his engineers can generate programs automatically from data such as CAD files with minimal manual effort, which is faster, easier and more accurate than programming from scratch. Moreover, Interconics is taking the opportunity to work with customers to optimise the flow of data to achieve the best possible programming efficiency.
The next phase of investment at Interconics will add full component-level traceability using Yamaha’s T-tool traceability software. Traceability, taking advantage of the common software platform unifying the line, is very important, as Weston explains. “With traceability we can not only solve manufacturing challenges more quickly and demonstrate that we can build our customers’ assemblies, but we can also share the data that shows exactly how we have built them. This will enhance our prototyping services, for example, by providing richer information for customers that ultimately will help optimise quality and efficiency in volume production.”
He also reveals plans to implement an automated component storage system later in 2015, which will allow individual customers a virtual dedicated store on the premises. “The Yamaha traceability tools dovetail neatly with our plans for automated storage. Together, these systems will enable us to provide each customer with full visibility of every aspect of their project, and deliver a further boost to efficiency. For example, we have already succeeded in building an advanced module for a US automotive customer, reducing the turnaround time from 16 weeks to seven days by taking advantage of our advanced technologies. With traceability and automated storage, I believe we can achieve a turnaround of three days.”
Yamaha will be sending an IT expert to Interconics to help setup the traceability system and provide initial training. “The depth of support that has been made available to us since we took delivery of our first Yamaha machines has been critical to helping us achieve our goals,” says Weston.
“We set out to push beyond the current boundaries of commercial manufacturing, and Yamaha has been open to building a strong partnership with us. We have worked together to find answers to our production challenges and feedback new knowledge that can help further improve the technology. It has been an extremely rewarding collaboration, and I am looking forward to achieving even greater successes together in the future.”
YSi-12 hybrid optical inspection station with integrated laser-based height and coplanarity checking for enhanced quality assurance.
