Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/831357
26 SMT Magazine • June 2017 ucts for my customer." But recently, the imple- mentation of closed loop uplink functions was really helpful, because you have all the infor- mation available at the end of the process. And now, we developed a lot of software features to help the customers use this information to op- timize their process. It means producing less de- fects and really evaluate what is going wrong in your process, and then to utilize this informa- tion to optimize your process—and therefore, cut down defects and cut down the cost. Las Marias: That involves a lot of data. Bornemann: Yes. While the collection of data is important, utilization of that data is also very important. So, we developed proper software tools that evaluate if the defects are coming from the pick-and-place machine or from the oven, for instance, and we work together with suppliers to feed that information back and pre- pare the data, store them properly, or feed them back properly to other machines in the SMT process. Las Marias: How do you help customers with their inspection strategy? Bornemann: All in all, you need to have a prop- er 3D approach. There are a lot of 3D machines available in the market. 3D has limitations, es- pecially when you have very tall capacitors and you have small chips in the shadows. So you need to have a technology that can cover this. The combination we are doing is for 3D, but we still have the options of 2D or 2.5D, making it possible to inspect the whole boards. If you only do it by 3D, you'll have still limitations. So, you have to have a proper 3D performance, plus the opportunities to still inspect the boards or the components where they are limited. So, this is basically what we are doing. I mean, one of the biggest limitations, usual- ly, was speed. So, you could go into 3D but you were really facing a speed issue. What we have done is we have increased our field of view of our angular cameras. And with this, we are pro- moting our so called XM Plus module, which is really tackling these limitations. So now we have a system which can do a full 3D measure- ment at in-line speed. This I would say is one of the key factors to really make a full 3D in-line measurement, in-line capable. 3D is the way to go, because especially com- ponents are getting smaller, boards are getting more populated. There are the limitations of the 2D, which is basically like lifted leads of small QFPs, fine pitch QFPs, and it is tombston- ing very small chips. You really reach the limi- tation over to the system. 3D helps you on, like I mentioned before, with first pass yield. This is getting more and more important, so 3D is helping you to increase your yield. Because sim- ply you have much more information available and this is the way to go. Las Marias: What are some of the key factors to consider when selecting a 3D AOI system? Bornemann: Basically, you should make sure that this is in-line capable, and that this is real measurement. You know, the difference be- tween inspection and measurement is that in- spection only tells you whether it's good or bad; but the measurement is the one that is really helping you. There's a lot of systems in the mar- ket who claim to do measurement, but if you look closer, it's just inspection. If you go for an Guido Bornemann 3D INSPECTION IS THE WAY TO GO