Swiss manufacturer of quartz crystals for clocks and mobile phones Micro Crystal uses the Cognex In-Sight 5401 vision system to inspect the packaging of ceramic surface mounted devices (SMDs) which ensure constant frequencies and time information in its products all over the world.
SMDs that have been incorrectly positioned or labelled have to be detected and removed in strips packaged in numbers of between 7,000 and 16,000. The same applies to the packaging areas of the SMD tapes that have gaps.
Since mid-2007, Micro Crystal has been using an Optical Tape End-Controller with an In-Sight 5401 to perfect packaging quality. Similar to a film cutting table, the roll of SMD tape is guided over a worktable on which the In-Sight 5401 subjects the individual miniature packages - measuring only millimetres and containing the vital quartz - to an automatic optical inspection.
The following criteria are examined and the results transferred to the monitor of a connected PC: is there an SMD in the package?; is the position of the SMD correct?; is the batch number lasered onto the ceramic housing of the SMD and if so, can it be perfectly read?
The In-Sight 5401 is supported by Cognex’s PatMax object location tool, which uses pattern matching technology to locate objects reliably even if they are of different sizes, differently aligned, if their appearance is poor or even if they are partly covered. With LED lighting, the Cognex system using PatMax, is claimed to detect laser marked batch numbers, which are not sharply contoured, “100 per cent of the time”.
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