Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1520956
70 PCB007 MAGAZINE I MAY 2024 of its most significant benefits, especially with the workforce issues manufacturers see every- where. It means better quality and reliability and far less labor. Hahn: is machine needs a little bit more energy than your big fridge at home; an esti- mated 50% energy savings, and we would say roughly a buyer experiences a 75% savings on labor and reduces their occupied floor space by 50%. e process is zero waste and basically zero maintenance. Give me more detail about the maintenance and calibration of the print heads. Hahn: e machine itself does not need any operator interaction. e printing strategy gets put into the system by CAM and down- loaded to the machine. e operator does not input any data. You can use different recipes, and it all happens automatically. Even the print head cleaning can be programmed periodically (typically one time per shi for <1 minute) in a fully integrated and automated cleaning sta- tion. All ink refill is done automatically by an external refill container station connected to the main tank of the system. Schmidt: For quality control, the printer runs a nozzle pattern before the daily production starts. A camera inside the system checks whether all the nozzles are printing well and verifies if additional cleaning is necessary. Has inkjet changed markedly over the past 10 years? Schmidt: Yes, because we learn a lot with every installation and special customer requirements. ere are also many more inks available than 10 years ago. Due to many Notion instal- lations, PCB makers are creating more interest in this new technology. In a discussion with Ashley Steers at Elec- tra during IPC APEX EXPO, all cus- tomers asked questions about the ink- Is the quality and reliability of the product better or equivalent to the traditional, standard process? Schmidt: It meets all IPC specifications, so it is equivalent, but it allows you to add features that you could not with the traditional subtrac- tive process, and it is a much more ecological and economical process. There are a lot of benefits for manufacturers, but change is never easy. How do you make ROI more concrete? Schmidt: ROI is tricky because much depends on the labor and energy costs. For instance, energy is expensive in Europe and cheap in China. Inkjet solder mask manufacturing is per- fect for mass production. It is digital and can be fully automated, and several process steps can be interconnected. One operator can super- vise several printing lines. Of the two systems in one, One is printing on the front side, the other on the rear side. Everything can be fully interconnected from pre-treatment through solder mask printing, final cure, and unloading into cassettes. Inside is a barcode scanner that scans the assembler code. Based on that, the machine knows to select a specific print pro- gram, and it just goes. On a traditional process line, you must have at least multiple operators to run the same process. at is probably one Figure 4: The machine set up at Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories' new facility in Idaho. (Source: SEL)