Amigos,
Let’s check in on Megyn Woodley as she helps Andover Electronics solve their response-to-pause problem…
Megyn Woodley had performed response-to-pause experiments on the solder paste that Andover Electronics was using, and a solder paste that she knew had good response-to-pause. She felt good that Charlie Barkley, who had originally given her a hard time, chose to work with her on the experiments. After seeing the results, Charlie became a fan of Megyn.
Megyn sat down to review the results of the response-to-pause experiments with Melissa Baron, owner, and Frank Blaine, COO of Andover.
Figure 1. Megyn reviewing the results of the response-to-pause experiments with Melissa Baron and Frank Blaine.
“The response-to-pause testing is quite simple. The solder paste is put on the stencil in the traditional way to be prepared for printing,” Megyn began. “Four prints are then performed on the stencil printer, and the volume of the stencil-printed deposits are measured. The printing is then paused for an hour and the process is repeated. This process is repeated three times.”
Megyn showed a graph of the results. “Note the difference in the two solder pastes.”
Figure 2. The results of the response-to-pause experiments. The current solder paste is labeled “Brand X,” the solder paste with good response-to-pause is labeled “Good Paste.”
“Yikes!” exclaimed Melissa.
“Ouch,” replied Frank.
“It’s quite easy to see why we lose production time. Look! The poor performing solder paste had 0 print volume on the first print after the third pause,” Melissa groaned.
“I remember you saying solder paste is not a commodity, Megyn. It seems so obvious when one looks at the response-to-pause data,” Frank summarized.
“So, this is what caused us to lose $1 million in lost production per year,” Melissa commented.
“Yes, and just think of how response-to-pause affects the world of electronic assembly. There are well over 100,000 assembly lines in the world. I’ll bet at least 10,000 of them are victims of poor response-to-pause,” Megyn summed up.
Figure 3. Solder pastes like Indium8.9HF from Indium Corporation have excellent response-to-pause.
Epílogo
Andover switched to Indium Corporation’s Indium8.9HF solder paste, known for having exemplary response-to-pause.
With the added production capability, they were able to accept more business. As a result, they are on track to make more than $1.2 million more than they did last year.
Salud,
Dr. Ron
