As electronic designers strive to reduce the physical space between components, boards are becoming more tightly packed. These crowded boards can be small cell phone-like boards, or standard sized boards with CSPs and passive components butted up very closely to each other.  The resulting situation makes it increasingly difficult to get a standard site cleaning tool into the rework area.  In addition to the concerns about physical size, there is also the concern of inadvertently disturbing adjacent components.

Based on User inputs, Air-Vac developed a Micro Tip Site Clean Assembly with a high temp, non-abrasive, composite vacuum micro tip. It has a heating exhaust inside diameter of 0.093” and a vacuum tip inside diameter of 0.063”, making it about half the size of the standard tip. Approximately 30% of the air flow is vented away from the site, allowing just enough heat to reflow the residual site solder, but not enough to disturb adjacent components. A vacuum sensor in the machine automatically adjusts the tip height to the board for non-contact site cleaning. The new Micro Tip Assembly can be used on Lead-Free and Leaded solder applications.

Some process development is required, so please contact your Regional Air-Vac Sales/Marketing personnel for assistance.

The new design is available for ONYX29 and ONYX32 Systems. It uses the same body as the standard site cleaning tool.

• 1015.11.056 Micro Site Cleaning Nozzle - Complete.

• 1015.11.059 Micro Site Cleaning Sub-Assembly, excluding body.