<title>Effectiveness of integrated lead inspection and conditioning</title>

Abstract

A novel solution to the problem of correcting leaded semiconductor packages damaged during test and handling is presented. The elimination of the high costs of reworking and maintaining lot integrity is accomplished by integrating a highly programmable lead conditioning system with the traditional lead inspection system. The equipment accommodates gull and J lead forms via a quick change lead conditioning tool. Devices ranging from 10 mm to 40 mm, square, rectangular, two or four sided can be effectively conditioned with no increase in setup time or decrease in overall throughput. The effectiveness or device recovery rate of such a system is documented with data from semiconductor manufacturing and printed board assembly environments. While previous methods relied on huge amounts of hand labor and very expensive hard tooling, the programmable conditioner allows a high product mix within the setup and changeover time of the inspection equipment. Data demonstrating the effectiveness and versatility of a `one-lead-at-a-time' conditioner is presented. Although the throughput is less than for inspection alone, the total cycle time and throughput are actually higher than for process configurations which separate inspection and conditioning. Conventional processing flows impose severe cycle time delays, hand labor costs and re-inspections that are eliminated in the integrated system. The major factors of determining the payback and justification for an integrated system are also discussed. The economic factors discussed include direct labor, capital cost, tooling cost and cycle time. Systems justified to date have done so on the basis of a single factor, the value of the recovered units. Intangible factors are also identified and discussed.