Gram,

I would consider the following 

1. cooling fixture to cool the pallets down after they come out of the reflow oven. Because the pallets will retain heat from the reflow process cooling the pallets down quickly will reduce the number of pallets needed. By cooling them quickly they will be able to be reused more quickly, minimizing the impact on paste slumping due to the heat transfer of warm pallets. This will help keep you pallet investment costs down. 
2. Put a metal guard on the pallet where the bump stop is. The bump stops tend to wear the pallets out quickly on high volume production and everything starts to drift. Another option would be to have the pallet supplier add a removable section that can be replaced over time.  If you think the operators will catch it, think again (load it and go)
3. if you have a left and a right design, have the left side pallet on one side and the right on the other. It will help minimize storage, cost and maintenance. 

Ted T.
  

-----Original Message-----
From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Graham Collins
Sent: Monday, September 16, 2013 2:32 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [TN] assembly of components to a flex

Hi TechNet
We have been asked by a customer to build a flex assembly for them. It is not complex, and the smallest part on it is a SOT-23, so it should be pretty easy on the difficulty scale.  But we have not done full flex assemblies before, we have done rigid/flex assemblies but...

Obviously we will need carrying fixtures to transport the flex circuit through the SMT line, does anyone have any recommendations for vendors for this sort of thing?

And are there any serious gotchas I should consider?  Polyimide flex, so moisture/bakeout is obviously a consideration.

--
regards,

Graham Collins
Senior Process Engineer
Sunsel Systems
(902) 444-7867 ext 211


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