Richard, I am a contract manufacturer and I use some forms of solder paste inspection. Are you interested in solder height or print quality or weight of what. We use 2-D inspection as part of our MPM UP-3000 system. We primarily check the fine pitch devices to make sure we are getting a good print. We also use a cyber-optics system during set-up of the screen printer and for trouble shooting when we are unsure of the height of the print. We use 6 mil thick stencils for all products. Depending on how the printer is set-up, we could get from 5.5 to 7.8 mils of solder paste. Obviously our goal is 6 mils of paste if we are using a 6 mil stencil but as we all know, it isn't a perfect world. If you can be more specific on what you are looking for I may be able to provide more details on why, etc. Regards, Wade Oberle -----Original Message----- From: Hamilton, Richard -4454 [SMTP:[log in to unmask]] Sent: Monday, January 04, 1999 11:17 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [TN] Solder Paste Application Happy New Year TechNetters, Well, it is a new year and we want to try something new. I am interested in information and experiences on measuring the paste that has been applied; what equipment, difficult/easy for operators, benefits of use, etc. When you reply and if you are a CM, knowing that would be helpful. As in the past, thanks for any info in advance. Richard Hamilton Clemar Mfg. / Rain Bird [log in to unmask] ################################################################ TechNet E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TechNet <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TechNet ################################################################ Please visit IPC's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################ ################################################################ TechNet E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TechNet <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TechNet ################################################################ Please visit IPC's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################