As a manufacturer of selective wave soldering equipment, it is essential to provide an explanation of the selective soldering process. This will facilitate the understanding of the working principle, advantages, and market prospects of selective wave soldering for the departments considering its use.
The increasingly fierce competition in the electronics market has brought significant quality and cost pressures to electronics manufacturers. The trend towards high-density and miniaturization in electronic product manufacturing processes has driven the rapid development of Surface Mount Technology (SMT). Traditional wave soldering processes can no longer meet the soldering needs of the remaining minority of through-hole components. Manual methods are inefficient for high-quality, high-efficiency soldering of components with large heat capacities or narrow spacing. Moreover, the cost advantage of labor over machine equipment is gradually diminishing. The development of mini selective wave soldering technology offers new options for electronic product manufacturing engineers. The low operating cost and high applicability of selective soldering have quickly gained popularity among electronics manufacturers.
The selective wave soldering system is a multi-axis manipulator platform controlled by programs, equipped with flux nozzles and solder pots. After positioning the PCB board through the track for online transportation, flux is accurately sprayed onto the soldering areas on the PCB board. Then, a precise circular mini-solder wave is created using a small nozzle (typically 2~4mm in diameter) and a solder pump. The soldering is performed from the bottom of the PCB board through the multi-axis manipulator platform. Since the components to be soldered are typically surrounded by SMT components with high density and small spacing, and to avoid damaging adjacent components and pads, the selective soldering process must be very precise.
The program control of the selective wave soldering system is very powerful, including motion, process speed, unrestricted directional control (X, Y, Z), temperature, and heat control. During selective wave soldering, the soldering parameters for each solder joint can be customized, providing enough process adjustment space to optimize the soldering conditions for each solder joint (such as flux spraying volume, soldering time, soldering height, wave height), thereby reducing the defect rate. All control parameters can be saved in the program, and relevant data can be retrieved from the program for each production cycle. Therefore, if the system is properly maintained, the soldering quality remains consistent even after several years.
