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20 SMT Magazine • September 2014 problem is easily overcome using a robot with a swing nozzle. The swing nozzle can pick a com- ponent and then swing the leads up to ninety degrees to make them perpendicular with the PCB for placement. This eliminates the need for an operator at a hand placing station or ex- pensive repackaging of the part. Stick feeding is common for SMT, but large or unique com- ponents in stick have often required expensive and one off designs. Since robots have started to be used in the SMT process stick feeders that allow for the stick handling portion to be adjustable and only the actual component track to be customized have been developed. These stick feeders are less expensive and make it more possible for PCB manufactures to handle a larger range of stick components. SMT machines are built for speed and accuracy. With that in mind, the SMT ma- chines typically have height restrictions as well as only moving in X, Y, R, and Z. A robot, on the other hand, can have less height restrictions and more moving axis. With the added height those tall or overly large parts can now be placed. Additional axes allow robots to do more than pick and place. Robots can pick A rObOt'S pLACe IN Smt continues up screws from a feeder and torque the screw into position; they can assemble cases in final assembly areas. Another solution robots in SMT have brought about is finding lead tips of plated through-hole (PTH) parts, which typically give SMT machines difficulty with vision. New cam- era technology now can find the lead tips of feATure figure 5: radial cut feeder. figure 6: vision system for through-hole parts.