Overview

In PCB assembly industry there is a need for support of rapid prototyping, while keeping soldering quality at highest level possible. The most common way of dispensing the solder paste material is to use laser-cut or etched metal stencils and a machine that is able to spread the solder paste on the PCB through the openings of this solder paste stencil. There are commercial machines available for printing solder paste selectively. The technology is called ''solder jet printing''.

Hardware

A solder jet printer has a dispenser head which accommodates a syringe and some pressure control mechanism. Pressure control can be done by using any of the following methods:

• Compressed air and an electronic valve (on-off valve) which turns the air pressure ON or OFF. This method is called pneumatic dispensing.
• Simple syringe-based extruder, where the piston of the syringe is directly driven by a stepper motor.
• Combined air pressure + extruder worm mechanics - in which the air pressure is turned on constantly and the actual extrusion amount is controlled by a stepper motor which drives a worm extruder.

Both methods have their own advantages and disadvantages, however FlatCAM should be able to generate code for both.

Gerber inputs

GCode implementation