Method for manufacturing electronic card modules

A method of automatically assembling components on a printed circuit board to form an electronic card module and testing the card module, said method comprising the steps of providing a plurality of processing stations with technologically identical processing stations being arranged in a cell with each cell having an associated conveyor system for transporting circuit boards between the stations of the cell, conveyor computer means associated with each cell for controlling the operation of the conveyor system, cell computer means for each cell controlling the operation of the conveyor computer means, and the operation of each of the individual processing stations of the cell in accordance to a type-associated work program;

• retrieving a specific printed circuit board type from a printed circuit board storage having several types in response to a command signal;
• reading an identification code on the circuit board to obtain information concerning the type of board;
• and then in response to the information obtained, conveying the circuit board through selected processing stations for assembling of compoenents on the circuit board, for soldering the components on the circuit board to form an electronic card module and then for testing the card module in response to the information obtained during the reading of the identification code, the step of testing including the steps of fault-locating and repairing located faults as necessary and the step of conveying through selected processing stations including supplying the individual printed circuit boards to the individual processing stations in response to control signals from the conveyor computer means and the cell computer means, and controlling the operation of the selected processing stations in response to the particular type of circuit board being processed to perform the operation at the selected processing stations.

A method of automatically assembling components on a printed circuit board to form an electronic card module and testing the car module, said method comprising the steps of providing a plurality of work stations arranged in cells of associated work stations, each of said cells having a cell computer means for controlling the operations therein, and a master computer controlling the operations of each of the cell computer means, said master computer being electrically connected to a further higher ranking computer, said master computer receiving a list of card modules to be produced and providing answerbacks regarding completed jobs, standstill times and component comsumption;

• retrieving a specific printed circuit board type from a printed circuit board storage having several types in response to a command signal;
• reading an identification code on the circuit board to obtain information concerning the type of board;
• then in response to the information obtained, conveying the circuit board through selected work stations of selected cells for assembling of components on the circuit board and for soldering the components on the circuit board to form an electronic card module and then testing the card module in response to the information obtained during the reading of the identification code, the step of testing including the steps of fault-locating and repairing located faults as neessary, said step of conveying including reporting progress of work load status for the work stations of each cell by the cell computer means to the master computer, and said master computer controlling the rate of removal of the printed circuit boards from a storage system to the cell and changing the speed of operation for the work stations in each cell by sending instructions to the cell computer means.

A system for assembling components on a circuit board to form electronic card modules, and for testing the various circuits of the electronic card modules, said system comprising means for retrieving a specific printed circuit board from a printed circuit board storage having several types of printed circuit boards;

• means for reading an identification code on the circuit board to obtain information concerning the type of board;
• a plurality of processing stations including stations for assembling components on the circuit board, stations for soldering the components on the circuit board to form an electrical card module, and stations for testing the card modu1e;
• said processing stations having technically identical processing being combined in cells, each cell having cell computer means for controlling the operation of the processing stations of the cell, cell conveyor means for transporting circuit boards between the various stations of the cell, and conveyor computer means for controlling the operation of the cell conveyor means;
• conveyor means for transporting the circuit boards between the various cells;
• and master computer means for controlling the operation of each of the stations and the conveyor means between the cells in response to said information, said stations for testing the card including at least one station having both fault-locating capabilities and fault-repairing capabilities.