Wood-Placer

[dampfboot]

Hello Forum,

because I have not that much space which is necessary for the original LitePlacer I have build a smaller version from laser cut wood. I call it the Wood-Placer. Main purpose is to populate a little PCB for my robot project Wood-Walker.com which has about 120 parts on the PCB - you can see it at the MAKER Faire Hannover this weekend.

After a first test phase in my shop I lent my machine to a friend who was in need to p&p some 1000 diodes for Flip-Dot circuits. Today he passed this video from a successful job.

https://twitter.com/Arduino_H/status/734666111032152064

I want to say thank you to Juha for his great software concept and the idea of the z-hit switch for the needle which makes all things so easy!

Rainer
from Hannover, Germany
wood-walker.com

[JuKu]

> have build a smaller version from laser cut wood.

Pictures, please!

[dampfboot]

Thank you for asking...

The main goal was to build it so small that it will fit into one drawer of my file cabinet near my desk. I don't have the need to build many PCBs but I don't like to place 120 parts by hand. You can open the drawer - play a little and close it again without any dust problems and go ahead with that project maybe in 2 month?!


(this was an early stage from end of April without cabel chain and so on)

The picker can be moved 400 x 300 mm over the table. Because the cam and the needle are close together I can pick parts in a field of roughly 370 x 280 mm. This is enough storage place for 50 individual part lanes and a capacity of 4 PCBs with about 120 parts each. But as mentioned above the main goal was to fit this thing into the drawer and this is what gives the rigid max dimension (700x 560 x 280)

Your Liteplacer project was exactly what I needed. I always order only small part volumes from China and will only have some general caps and resistors on a reel. Additional I like your concept to compensate all kind of misalignment by the software and the cameras. I have build 2 well working precise CNC mills already from cast aluminum and cast iron parts which I had designed - so technical it would not be a problem for me to build an equal p&p machine but I really like to do it the easy way also. And I like to play with the laser cutter too. It's so great, you design it at the computer and 1 hour later you can touch your prototype with your hands - and the material costs are like nothing.

I used the logitech 280 cameras as up- and down-looking optics. I removed the housing and the microphone. I had to save space in the height to close my drawer! This is the holder for the up looking camera with an LED ring and a white Plexiglas diffuser.



This was the first test run with my self made Tiny G:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoHkHOSYF2M

This was the first pick by camera:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8b5VcsUPP8

Think all you guys know about this magic moments...

Rainer
from Hannover, Germany

[dampfboot]

Yesterday I tested my first part holders made from laser cut MDF. They are equiped with a long shim to press the parts strip to the top guide of the holder under it's full length. By this you get a firm base of all parts and an equal distance from the stripe surface to the camera what makes focussing quite easy. I have to lift the PCB to the same height also later.


Because of my needs each of the small holders can take up to 40 parts - the longer ones up to 65. Thats enough for my project to make 10 PCB batches with one parts load - the tray holds about 50 different values and 1500 parts in total - that's all what fits on my little Wood-Placer...

Rainer from Hannover, Germany

[Pixopax]

Hello Rainer, its similar to my machine, could you give me details about the shim you use to press the tapes to the guide?

[dampfboot]

It is a multi chim design with 3 mm heig and 12 mm wide steps made from 5 mm MDF the red-brown part is glued to the base. You can put a white or plack paper on top of the grey chim to get best contrast in the holes.


I could share the dxf file if you like.

Rainer

[mawa]

Rainer, an ingenious solution!

I will implement that in my 3D printed trays!

Just one question: how do yo lock the chims that they do not slide back leftwards?

[dampfboot]

Maybe the MDF laser cut has the advantage that it has a high friction - so you don't have to do any additional fixing than just sliding the chims over each other.

My first design has had a set screw to keep the parts from getting loose but it is not necesary. With 3D printing you might want to print the chim contact surface 90° to the long axis to generate a coupling effect in the contact plane.

[mawa]

Thank you Rainer,

I think I will try to prolong the left "grip" down to the holder plate surface and add a 2mm screw running through a hole in the left plus an embedded 2mm nut in the static (darkred) bottom part.
One could omit the nut but I don't want to rely on the "pseudo" thread the screw produces when it is screwed in. I already successfully use a similar technique in the timing belt tightener of my pnP head.
Printing on the side (just like your laser cut) should deliver a quite smooth ramp and even surface.

[dampfboot]

Ooops M2 is not my size
But in general it sounds good - please share your results!
Rainer