PCB: The Comparison Between Laser

Marking and Traditional Processing

Guide reading: Inkjet printer plays an important role in PCB industry. Compared to

the traditional inkjet marking, the superiority of laser marking becomes more and

more outstanding.

PCB (Printed Circuit Board) has the same cycle as global economy. PCB industry

hasn't been spared in the global sales slump influenced by the global economy in the

past two years. The first half year of 2014 sees an economic return to the boom, so as

the PCB industry market. Since the Ministry announced and approved China Telecom

and China Unicom to carry out FDD & TDD hybrid networking trial, numerous 4G

base stations have been under construction and intelligent terminal has been

developing in a large scale, which is a catalyzer for PCB booming.

PCB is an important part of electronic industry; its output value occupies a quarter of

the total value of electronic industry, which is the largest proportion in various

electronic components divisions. FPC is one of the sub-sectors in PCB industry that

increases the fastest. After massive restructuring and upgrading, domestic PCB and

FPC manufacturers have caught the opportunity, which increases the production value

proportion of Chinese circuit board in global market.

Traditional machining is unable to meet customers' requirements on quality while

common laser cannot achieve mass production. These are bottlenecks for the

development of PCB industry. At the same time, ink-jet printer plays an important

role in PCB industry development. In order to prevent from being counterfeited as

well as to effectively manage the regional sales, manufacturers usually use high-tech

anti-counterfeiting means to mark the products. At the present stage, ink-jet is widely

used and some problems are emerging, such as great amount of consume materials,

too much cost, professional maintenance, marking is easy to be wiped and altered, and

environment pollution. Ink-jet fails to keep pace with the development of the industry

which will be replaced by laser marker gradually.

PCB Laser Marking Machine

Laser marker can processing serial number and two-dimension code, recording

production information for tracing and quality control. Laser marking is expanding

rapidly in PCB industry.

The traditional way of code in PCB is label or ink mark which has many

disadvantages.

Below is comparison between laser marking and traditional marking in PCB:

PCB laser wipe machine is a cleaning equipment for PCB, which is a displacement of

traditional fiber and rubber wipe machine. The cleaning function is realized by super

speed galvanometric scanning system, applied in PCB surface of USB flash disk,

camera, card reader, etc., which ensure the strong electrical conductivity and good

contact. Its speed is 10 times the traditional artificial cleaning.

Disadvantages of Traditional Processing:

1. Clean by chemical reagent. It has pollution to the environment and the remaining

moisture content in the PCB will lead to potential risks of short circuit and electric

leakage. Which is seldom used in COB now.

2. Clean by manual work. Rubber or fiber used to wipe by manual work. It generates

high workload and has low efficiency and unstable cleaning quality.

3. Clean by automation equipment such as wipe machine; Wipe machine clean PCB

by round rubber or fiber. It reduce workload and promote efficiency, which is 3 times

that of manual work. Different cleaning parameter can be set according to different

oxide layer and dirt and dynamic wipe machine use rubber or fiber to work rapidly

and vertically without being impacted by SMT components near the fixed position,

thus ensure the cleaning quality.

Advantages of Laser Processing:

1. WINDOWS2000 Chinese operation interface, which is easy to learn and use;

2. accurate CCD image visual teaching to realize fast programming;

3. continual wipe on irregular line or surface, such as arbitrary points, 3D lines and

arc;

4. better wipe effects with high-speed and low noise speed governing brushless DC

motor;

5. strong dust-arrester installation;

6. statics controlled within ±100V;

7. dynamics self-compensating to achieve easier operation;

8. extensive used charging tray applying to various workpieces.