Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1479191
32 PCB007 MAGAZINE I SEPTEMBER 2022 and keeps the chemistry within a tight oper- ating window. e other one is much more extensive, and that's where engineering comes in. ere's a lot to do with imaging. All the pro- cesses must come together. It's not just plating, the materials, or the materials handling. It's the etching, imaging, surface preparation, the workflow, and how people manage it. In this industry, there's so much going on at one time and it's all interrelated. The Special Brownfield Challenges Johnson: In the ought Leaders paper, mech- anization and automation is strongly implied. Such as, if you were to go through that $10 mil- lion upgrade, you'll have a lot more mecha- nization and automation available to you on the manufacturing floor. Can you do this in a brownfield site? Carano: at's a good question. You walk in, you say, "Here's what I would do right here." You've got an etcher in this corner, and you've got imaging over here and you carry the panels from imaging to etching or developing. Early in my career, I was working with direct met- allization horizontal processing. You start with bare copper, go through horizontal desmear and then drilling. So, it's horizontal desmear, down through the direct metallization line. You shorten the process because direct metalliza- tion really squeezed a lot of time and increased productivity as well as quality. From there, it goes into a slit in the wall, into a cut sheet lam- inator, the photoresist gets laminated, and the panel imaged. en it goes into another room and gets developed, etched, and stripped, all automated, all horizontal. You can do a lot with that. You don't have to say, "I must make this workable. I must make 10,000 panels a day." No, you don't. You can size the equipment properly, you replace the equipment with the latest in etching technol- ogy. It's probably a shorter footprint, and you just do it horizontally. In Asia, almost every- thing is horizontal processing in some way, shape, or form, except maybe for the electro- plating. But I've seen people do electroplat- ing horizontally, in a continuous fashion, and yet they have a lot of engineers. ose engi- neers are freed up to solve any technical issues because they're constantly watching that. ere's a grocery store by my house that has automated most of the cashiers, but they didn't eliminate the jobs. Instead, they put the people out in the aisles to help you find what you're looking for. ey guide you to find what you need and if they can't find it, they go to the stockroom and get it for you. at's where you get that personal touch. If you have engineers on the floor, instead of wor- rying about running the horizontal line, they're solving problems and keeping everything in tight control. Audit those processes on a reg- ular basis. Is it getting out of control? Are the temperatures rising or is it out of control? It's all about variation. Some people, like Happy Holden, are firm believers in process audits and how to control things. As I've talked to Happy, I've learned it could be done in a reasonable fashion with less money. Most people think it's going to cost millions and millions. It's not. Johnson: If it's a brownfield site that has a very difficult workflow, they've got a problem. ey have to start at step zero and develop a work- flow before they can take advantage of the automation.