Good idea with your "Palooza" web site....I know its been referenced for
awhile & also been the virtual meeting place of all things "PCB" for some
time. I have travelled there several times when a topic catches my current
attention.....
The virtual café.....
Great pics of PCB issues.....Pics spell out issues faster than words can
convey....
Regards
TDK
-----Original Message-----
From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Stephen Gregory
Sent: Tuesday, April 19, 2005 5:24 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [TN] "Poor mans" custom board support...
Hi all!
I'm sure a lot of us have heard the saying; "Necessity is the Mother of
Invention", well I ran across a
situation where it became necessary to come up with something to solve a
problem.
We have this assembly here that is in a vey fragile panel. The individual
board is only 1-inch wide,
about 4.5-inches long, .031 thick, and double-sided SMT that is fairly
dense.
Building the first side isn't a big problem, but when we get to the second
side, my operators pull their
hair out trying to set-up the board supports...there isn't much room to
position the support for each board
as you will see in the picture on my web page, and often wind up breaking a
panel or two when it is half
built because it is so fragile. It ain't no fun when that happens...
I can't take credit for the initial idea, actually our Production Manager
planted the seed, but I took his
idea and ran with it.
I'm sure many of you have heard of "Gel-Flex" support tooling from MPM.
Very unique tooling, and if
any of you have priced this tooling, you know you will be paying for this
"unique-ness".
I made some what I call; "Okie Foam-Flex" tooling today. Only spent about
2-hours fiddling and cutting,
measuring and checking, and finally come-up with something that works in
our Assembleon Topaz and
Emerald for board support. It's fool-proof for our operators, and takes all
of 2-minutes to set it in place.
You can see all the pictures at: http://www.stevezeva.homestead.com and
look at; "Flimsy Panel, Foam
Flex, Foam Flex 2, and Checking Support".
I made this from layers of static dissipative foam that we had laying
around, and double-sided sticky tape.
The bottom black layers are a high density, stiff type of foam, and the top
layer is a soft "squishy" egg
carton patterned foam.
I had to make measurements, and cut out areas to allow for the board
present sensor, the board push-in
actuator, and some other hardware that is mounted on the moveable rail of
the machine, but really wasn't
difficult at all. Best of all, it really works great!
I know this board support doesn't look all that "High Tech", but it was
cheap, and does the job as good as
that all the other expensive flexible tooling does. Granted, it is custom
for each assembly, but it will get one
through in a pinch.
I'm just posting this in hope that maybe one day it will get someone else
out of a pinch when needed...
Kind regards,
-Steve Gregory-
Senior Process Engineer
LaBarge Incorporated
Tulsa, Oklahoma
(918) 459-2285
(918) 459-2350 FAX
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