Dual-in-line BGA ball mounter

Details Dual-in-line BGA ball mounter Dual-in-line BGA ball mounter

2000-09-26

2002-07-02

Dunn, Tom (Department: 1725)

Metal fusion bonding

With means to juxtapose and bond plural workpieces

Plural discrete workpieces

C228S009000, C228S033000, C228S047100

Reexamination Certificate

active

06412680

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to semiconductor manufacturing, and, in particular, to a technique for implementing a ball grid array (BGA) fabrication line.
2. Description of the Related Art
Due to the popularity of surface mount technology, the demand for semiconductor devices in ball grid array (BGA) packages is increasing. However, the ball mounting process (e.g., mounting solder balls to the bottom of a BGA package which are reflowed to form contacts with solder pads on a board or flex circuit) is very expensive. As shown in
FIG. 1
, a conventional BGA ball mount line
100
comprises a ball mount cell
104
, a reflow oven
108
, and a flux cleaner
110
. Ball mount line
100
further comprises a loading cell
102
at its beginning, an offloading cell
112
at its end, and transfer cells
106
between ball mount cell
104
and reflow oven
108
and between flux cleaner
110
and offloading cell
112
. Ball mount cell
104
typically comprises a fluxer
114
that applies flux to a BGA package, a sphere mounter
116
that applies solder balls (spheres) to the BGA package under heat and pressure, and a post mount inspection station
118
that inspects the solder balls for proper mounting. Typical ball mount cells, such as ball mount cell
104
, are configured to be operated from only one side of the BGA ball mount line (e.g., with an operator positioned at location
120
in FIG.
1
).
A conventional BGA ball mount line is long (e.g., about 11.5 meters), requiring substantial floor space, consuming substantial quantities of power and water, and requiring a significant capital investment. Additionally, a conventional BGA ball mount line requires a dedicated operator to operate the ball mount cell.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a method for mounting solder balls on a ball grid array which improves the utilization of labor, water, and electrical power while reducing capital investment. According to the present invention, a BGA ball mount line is configured with a dual in-line ball mounter comprising two parallel ball mount cells. The two ball mount cells of the dual in-line ball mounter feed devices to a single reflow oven and a single flux cleaner to form a more efficient BGA ball mount line.
In one embodiment, the present invention is a BGA ball mount line, comprising (a) first and second loading cells; (b) a dual in-line ball mounter comprising first and second ball mount cells, wherein the first loading cell is configured to transfer a first stream of BGA devices to the first ball mount cell; the second loading cell is configured to transfer a second stream of BGA devices to the second ball mount cell; and the first and second ball mount cells are configured to operate concurrently to mount solder balls onto the first and second streams of BGA devices; (c) a first transfer cell configured to receive the first and second streams of BGA devices from both the first and second ball mount cells of the dual in-line ball mounter; (d) a reflow oven configured to receive the first and second streams of BGA devices from the first transfer cell and perform a single reflow process concurrently on both the first and second streams of BGA devices; (e) a flux cleaner configured to receive the first and second streams of BGA devices from the reflow oven and clean flux concurrently from both the first and second streams of BGA devices; (f) a second transfer cell configured to receive the first and second streams of BGA devices from the flux cleaner; and (g) first and second offloading cells, wherein the first offloading cell is configured to receive the first stream of BGA devices from the second transfer cell; and the second offloading cell is configured to receive the second stream of BGA devices from the second transfer cell.


REFERENCES:
patent: 5626277 (1997-05-01), Kawada
patent: 5872051 (1999-02-01), Fallon et al.
patent: 5899737 (1999-05-01), Trabucco
patent: 5984166 (1999-11-01), Holzmann
patent: 5989471 (1999-11-01), Lian et al.
patent: 6103549 (2000-08-01), Master et al.
patent: 6186392 (2001-02-01), Ball
patent: 6283358 (2001-09-01), Ball
patent: 6284996 (2001-09-01), Kim et al.
patent: WO 99/17595 (1999-04-01), None

Affiliated with

Also associated with

Rating

Dual-in-line BGA ball mounter does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.

If you have personal experience with Dual-in-line BGA ball mounter, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Dual-in-line BGA ball mounter will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-2845669