NPI Award 2014 for HOTFLOW
NPI Award 2014 for HOTFLOW 4/26
.... And the NPI Award in the category reflow systems goes to the HOTFLOW 4/26, the top model of the newest generation of Ersa reflow soldering systems. The award was presented to Kurtz North America on the occasion of the IPC APEX EXPO in Las Vegas.
On an annual basis, the US trade magazine "Circuits Assembly" presents its NPI Award to highlight leading edge products in the area of electronic manufacturing. Neutrally and independently, experienced electronics engineers evaluate proposals received following criteria such as:
- Creativity and Innovation
- Compatibility with existing technologies
- Efficiency
- Design
- Reliability
- Flexibility
- Ease of maintenance
- Performance and throughput
- User friendliness
HOTFLOW 4 – a worthy winner of the award
The current HOTFLOW 4 was developed in accordance with the concept of sustainability and conservation of resources. During the course of this development, Ersa′s specialists closely examined individual aspects such as the drive technology, energy transfer, heat losses and cooling, and deduced measures to increase the general efficiency. This new reflow system offers a technological edge, which Ersa customers can use to optimize their manufacturing process - in quality, cost and service. One example: By using, for the worldwide first time, DC motors in a reflow system, it is possible, depending on the operating point, to cut energy consumption by more than 50%.
Intelligent Construction Details
Ersa HOTFLOW 4 reflow systems can be supplied with an effective exhaust air cleaning unit and a number of different of cooling systems. As a result, power consumption of the cooling system drops from 5 kW to 2 kw. Maintenance, which can be performed quickly and without special tools, is not being called for in predetermined intervals but is rather scheduled in dependence to the throughput. In addition, intelligent design details reduce the maintenance effort by another 30%, thus increasing the availability of the system for production. The completely new and innovative nitrogen control minimizes the consumption of the costly medium by 20%, and, through the use of efficient blower motors, the total energy saving is over 25%.
With the Grip conveyor, Ersa offers an uncomplicated PCB transport through the reflow system - without additional aids or the need for special preparation of the boards. It allows processing, one after the other, a mix of boards of between 0, 1 - 6 mm thickness without requiring any adjustment or set-up. With a process length of 7 meter, divided in 26 heated and 4 cooling zones, the HOTFLOW 4 features a high degree of energy efficiency and increased throughput - all the while maintaining the traditionally high Ersa quality of the solder joints and excellent process stability. A strong combination when joined by our selective soldering systems, and surely "the next step" to a genuine success story!