Vacuum tweezers: description and characteristics

Non-industrial design and manufacture of radio devices and devices is associated with a huge number of technical problems, among them lack of necessary technological elements, limited choice of materials and components, lack of experience or professional skills. Industry today offers a wide range of auxiliary devices that greatly simplify many of the tasks facing radio amateur designers. Vacuum tweezers are one of them.

Appointment

The device is very popular among professionals and amateurs to perform work related to the precise positioning of fairly small or fragile parts.

In the usual view, tweezers (from the French pincette) are a device with two brushes for grasping and carrying objects, tactile contact with which is undesirable or impossible. Unlike simple spring metal, vacuum tweezers do not require any extra effort to fix the element. This duty is entrusted to the air, or rather its absence is a vacuum.

Scope of the device

The scope of application is determined by the need to perform fine work. In the jewelry business, the device is used for the precise installation of precious stones (inserts) in wax model molds. The element is immersed in the required depth, without violating the structural integrity of the model.

In the electronics industry and amateur workshops, tweezers facilitate the capture and retention of radio components, miniature plastic and metal parts. Another important property - most devices have antistatic performance. Microelectronics today is characterized by an incredible density of active components in the chip chip. Despite the small amount of electrostatic discharge, the consequences for the internal structure of the integrated circuit can be critical. And this, in turn, does not exclude the failure of all, sometimes expensive, electronic equipment.

Vacuum tweezers will be a great help in manipulating the details of the watch movements, with elements containing hazardous chemicals in their composition.

Mechanical devices

More affordable devices with a mechanical (manual) drive. In the simplest case, the tweezers are a rubber pear with a sucker at the end. Such a tool (for example, Bubl-Vac (USA), is able to hold up to 115 grams). It is the most economical solution, but it is not very convenient for them to work with very small details.

Tweezer vacuum FFQ939 has a more advanced and elegant design. The maximum weight of the lifted part is 40 g. It is equipped with three heat-resistant suction cups of different diameters (4, 6 and 10 mm). Reliable and easy to operate. In fact, it is the same rubber pear, but hidden in a beautiful silver cylinder (slightly thicker than an ordinary pencil), ending with an igloo-shaped nozzle.

A similar design has a manipulator "Vampire" (Elme, Italy), but instead of a pear it has a piston. The classic bundle looks a little richer. Suction cups of vacuum tweezers are presented in various versions: power - for mounting chips in sockets, heat-resistant - to remove hot chips when evaporating.

A significant disadvantage of such devices is the gradual depressurization and, as a consequence, the weakening or complete loss of fixation of the part.

Homemade Vacuum Tweezers

Now even in a remote province, using the services of the World Wide Web, you can order in the online stores any tool with delivery to the nearest post office. But if there is not enough strength for waiting (it burns the thirst for creativity), to make the simplest vacuum tweezers with their own hands in real time in just five minutes. All that is required for this, is purchased at the nearest pharmacy and building store:

• A medical disposable syringe (2-5 ml) with a needle;
• Dropper (system for blood transfusion);
• Silicone sealant or tape.

Instead of the piston in the syringe, with the seal of the joint, the end of the plastic tube from the dropper is started - and the vacuum tweezers of our own production are ready!

Everyone in their childhood drank cocktails through a tube, so the mechanism of the device is easy to understand. He lifted the needle, sucked in air through the second end of the tube and the element was fixed.

Electric drive

The construction of electric vacuum tweezers is very diverse. If desired, everyone can choose an instrument based on financial possibilities - from democratic models of domestic or Chinese production to complex technical complexes of Western monsters of the electronic industry.

Discharge on the working bodies of such devices (150-600 mBar) is created by electric pumps (compressors) of diaphragm type, power from 5 to 30 watts. The set usually includes replaceable antistatic heat-resistant suction cups of various diameters and end needles of several configurations. Capable of holding parts weighing up to 200 grams. It should be noted that all the devices produced are rather compact and low-noise.

Browse popular models

Tweezers vacuum "Master" produced by the Saratov scientific and technical center of the same name - a small and ergonomic tool. The weight of the device is only 40 grams, electric power is 3 W, the discharge force is 150 mbar. It is equipped with silicone suckers of three sizes: 3, 6 and 9 mm.

Another representative of the Russian production - BM-0.8 (NTF "TERMOPRO" LLC, Moscow) is positioned as a super-powerful, fast and convenient tool, recommended for the serial installation of radio components. Comfortable work of the operator is provided by a foot pedal of air pumping control. The vacuum value has a smooth adjustment from 200 to 450 mbar. Power consumption - 5 Watts. There are three suckers in the set (5, 8 and 13 mm) and four needle fittings.

Finishes review Quick 381A (PRC). Power consumption is 15W. Discharging 250 mbar allows you to manipulate parts weighing up to 120 grams. The weight of the device itself is about a kilogram. It is equipped with replaceable suction cups, needles and a foot control pedal.

Professional Equipment

For use in industrial purposes, rather complicated and expensive systems are produced. They can be either single-channel (with one vacuum outlet for tweezers), and multichannel systems that serve several jobs at once. Professional products are generously equipped with interchangeable attachments, additional accessories and many useful functions.

For example, the vacuum device V8-100A from Virtual Indastries (Colorado, USA) is equipped with 9 standard sizes of suction cups and 16 needles of various configurations, a lot of supports, holders and brackets. A manual or foot switch can be used for control . The vacuum pump is switched on and off automatically when the gripper is removed from the holder. Comfort of operation is guaranteed by a large-scale magnifying glass on a movable bracket and a LED backlight.

How to make an electric vacuum from a manual vacuum

Many radio amateurs make electric vacuum tweezers with their own hands from an unnecessary aquarium compressor. However, the whole reworking is to hermetically connect its input (air intake fitting) to the input of a self-made or purchased (the same FFQ939) clamp. For the connection, the notorious plastic transparent tube from the dropper is used. If you use rubber shock absorbers from an unnecessary computer keyboard or DVD drive as suckers, and at the same time to achieve tightness of all connections, you will get a good vacuum tweezers.

Compressor aquarium in power is ideal and will provide the necessary amount of vacuum. Control vacuum can be drilled in the body of the tweezers hole of 2-3 mm. And further development of the device is a matter of personal initiative and technical creativity. In this area, there is always something to strive for.

Working with SMD components

The use of SMD-elements guarantees an increase in the density of installation. In mass production, the technological circuit for manufacturing printed circuit boards is simplified (the drilling operation for holes is dropped out). Therefore SMD-parts are gradually supplanting the traditional with wire leads, both in industry and amateur radio electronics.

Elements of surface mounting are convenient, but miniaturized. Vacuum tweezers for SMD-mounting - not a luxury, but a necessity. It allows you to quickly and accurately place parts on the board.

BGA components

Further improvement of the technology of surface mounting of radio components, aspiration of the developers of electronic devices to minimize the linear dimensions of their products led to the creation of microchips in the BGA ( an abbreviation of English - an array of balls ). Mounting ball contacts are located on the entire bottom surface of the chip body, which significantly increases the density of installation. In addition to gain in size, BGA components are characterized by increased heat dissipation. By reducing the length of leads, the influence of background pickups is significantly reduced, which allows increasing the value of operating frequencies and the speed of information exchange.

The only drawback is the difficulty of carrying out repair and restoration works. The dismantling, reballing (restoration of contact solder balls), mounting of BGA-elements require not only extensive experience, special skills, strict compliance with technology, but also the availability of professional equipment and accessories. Vacuum tweezers for BGA - an indispensable attribute of such a set.

In the system

Radio amateurs in their arsenal, in addition to vacuum tweezers, should have a certain solder, flux, solder mask, infrared soldering station or good thermo-foam.

Professionals use special complexes for carrying out similar tasks. For example, the TF-550 is a convection system designed to work with BGA-elements with the distance between pads to 1 mm. This is a rather complex intellectual device with the task of the thermal profile of the convection flow, the bottom heating of the board, etc. More I want to dwell on the device of the thermowell. It is a very ergonomic tool, which includes an adjustable vacuum forceps (gripper), located with a nozzle on one axis.

In the process of work, the tweezers not only fix the element, but also serve as a support for the soldering iron. This saves the radio operator from having to monitor the continuity of the gap between the nozzle and the body of the element.

Summary results

For most radio amateurs, the question of the need for vacuum tweezers in the arsenal of equipment has been solved long ago - definitely needed! Although there are skeptics who object that the fingers have remarkably surface-mounted elements. As they say - have the right.

But even if someone likes to burn their hands, modern technologies dictate their conditions. The density of the placement of parts on electronic boards is close to such values that not only your fingers - miniature brunchs will not wind between them. Vacuum tweezers for chips in QFP cases also have no alternative. Thin planar leads around the perimeter of the chip can easily be bent or damaged by any other tool.

But what model to choose, one decides for himself, based on the nature and volume of work performed. The assortment presented on the modern market makes it easy to do this.