METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR POPULATING PRINTED CIRCUIT BOARDS

• US 20170374745A1
• Filed: 11/19/2015
• Published: 12/28/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 01/14/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Siemens AG
• Original Assignee: Siemens AG
• Inventors: PFAFFINGER, ALEXANDER, ROYER, CHRISTIAN
• Granted Patent: US 10,555,422 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 13/085 Production planning, e.g. of allocation of products to machines, of mounting sequences at machine or facility level
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 13/0857 Product-specific machine setup; Changeover of machines or assembly lines to new product type
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 3/0097 Processing two or more printed circuits simultaneously, e.g. made from a common substrate, or temporarily stacked circuit boards H05K3/0052 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 3/34 by soldering

Abstract

Provided is a method for populating printed circuit boards, which includes the steps of acquiring jobs, in each case relating to populating printed circuit boards of a printed circuit board type on the pick-and-place line, and associated probabilities by a job is to be executed in each case, assigning printed circuit board types of the jobs to set-up families, determining for each set-up family the characteristic number which comprises the sum of probabilities of those jobs, the printed circuit board types of which are comprised by the set-up family, optimizing the assignment in such a way that the characteristic numbers of different set-up families are as different as possible, providing a set-up from one of the determined set-up families on the pick-and-place line, and populating printed circuit boards on the pick-and place line.

Claims

1. A method for populating printed circuit boards

by a pick-and-place line,

wherein set-up families having associated set-ups are provided,

wherein each set-up family is assigned at least one printed circuit board type, and each set-up is assigned at least one component type,

such that a printed circuit board of a printed circuit board type of a set-up family can be populated by components of the component types of the set-up assigned to the printed circuit board type on the pick-and-place line;

wherein a set-up can be implemented in the form of supplies of components of the component types, in order to be fitted on the pick-and-place line,

wherein the method comprises the following steps;

acquiring jobs, in each case relating to the population of printed circuit boards of a printed circuit board type on the pick-and-place line, and associated probabilities with which a job is to be executed in each case;

assigning printed circuit board types of the jobs to set-up families;

determining, for each set-up family, a characteristic number which comprises the sum of probabilities of those jobs, the printed circuit board types of which are comprised by the set-up family,

optimizing the assignment in such a way that the characteristic numbers of different set-up families are as different as possible,

providing a set-up from one of the determined set-up families on the pick-and-place line; and

populating printed circuit boards on the pick-and-place line.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein optimization is executed such that the number of set-up families is minimized.

3. The method as claimed in claim 1 or 2, wherein the method is executed with respect to a predefined time period, wherein the processing time for a job does not exceed said time period.

4. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein probabilities are determined with reference to previous jobs.

5. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the set-up families are constituted individually in sequence, and optimization is executed in each case such that a number of jobs which can be processed using set-ups from the set-up families is maximized.

6. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the set-up families are constituted individually in sequence, and optimization is executed in each case such that, for the printed circuit board types assigned to a new set-up family, the following characteristic number is minimized:

log(1−

p_r);

where p_r is the probability of an occurrence of a job for the population of printed circuit boards of printed circuit board type r.

7. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein optimization is executed by mixed integer optimization.

8. A computer program product, comprising a computer readable hardware storage device having computer readable program code stored therein, said program code executable by a processor of a computer system to implement a method with programming code means for executing a method according to claim 1, where said computer program product is run on a processing device or is stored on a computer-readable data medium.

9. A control device for populating printed circuit boards by a pick-and-place line,

wherein set-up families having associated set-ups are provided,

wherein each set-up family is assigned at least one printed circuit board type, and each set-up is assigned at least one component type,

such that a printed circuit board of a printed circuit board type of a set-up family can be populated by means of components of the component types of the set-up assigned to the printed circuit board type on the pick-and-place line;

wherein a set-up can be implemented in the form of supplies of components of the component types, in order to be fitted on the pick-and-place line,

wherein the control device is designed;

to acquire jobs, in each case relating to the population of printed circuit boards of a printed circuit board type on the pick-and-place line, and associated probabilities with which a job is to be executed in each case;

to assign printed circuit board types of the jobs to set-up families;

to determine, for each set-up family, a characteristic number which comprises the sum of probabilities of those jobs, the printed circuit board types of which are comprised by the set-up family,

to optimize assignment in such a way that the characteristic numbers of different set-up families are as different as possible; and

to control the population of printed circuit boards on the pick-and-place line where a set-up from one of the determined set-up families is fitted on the pick-and-place line.