High-Volume Ball Placement System

The VAi 3150 high-volume ball placement system has been introduced. Designed to address the high throughput requirements of grid array package manufacturing, the system delivers high-speed ball placement for standard and fine pitch BGA and CSP applications.

The system eliminates traditional barriers to high throughput placement with the company's patented Positive Mask ball placement technology. This enables it to place every ball on every pad simultaneously. The result is a robust throughput capacity for high-volume production.

Further enhancements to throughput and flexibility are provided by the system's dual configuration architecture. Two placement modules allow two different substrates to be processed simultaneously, maximizing machine utilization, or a single substrate can be processed using both modules in parallel, effectively doubling the capacity of the machine and providing maximum throughput. The system can be purchased with a single processing module and later upgraded to dual configuration, offering complete back-end line balancing to allow manufacturers to match equipment investment with capacity needs and minimize per-pin assembly costs.

The vision system combines high-resolution CCD camera technology with the company's Visionscape inspection platform to ensure ball integrity and 100% ball pick-up prior to placement. The system also inspects for ball quality and location following placement. An integrated handling system maximizes the efficiency of the dual configuration architecture while minimizing the number of times strips are handled. With a footprint of 2.2 sq m, the system takes up little factory floor space.

Robotic Vision Systems, 5 Shawmut Road, Canton, MA 02021. Tel: 781-821-0830; Fax: 781-828-8942.