TECHNOLOGY
MOTHERBOARDS
How’s your
Motherboard
Manufactured?
H
ave you ever wondered how
those shining green boards that
make up your computer are
manufactured? What complex process
ensures the proper working of all that
intricate electronics? To find out, we
made a trip to the board assembly plant
of XO Infotech at Gurgaon.
The manufacture of any circuit board—
be it the motherboard or any one of the
daughter cards that sit on it—has four
distinct steps. These are—the design of the
board including selection of components,
the design of the PCB (Printed Circuit
Board) where all the electrical paths are
fitted onto a compact board, the
manufacture of the PCB, and finally,
assembling the rest of the components on
the PCB to get the completed board. The
first two of these call for more design skills
than manufacturing ones, and there are
specialized agencies that do just these. The
third—the manufacture of the PCB
board—is a mass process where
economies of scale come to play, and this
could be outsourced. What we look at here
is how the other components are mounted
on a fabricated PCB to get the final
motherboard.
Today’s motherboards are manu-
factured by a process called Surface
Mount Technology (SMT). That is, the
components are mounted on the surface
of a PCB. Mounting can be done on both
sides of the board using this technology.
However, in a motherboard, only one side
is used.
We start with the ready PCB.
Components need to be soldered onto
this board at predetermined points.
There are three types of components
that are soldered onto a board. First
come the smaller components that are
on just one side of the board—that is,
there’s no wire passing through the
board to the other side. Then there are
the larger components that are again on
one side only. Finally, there are
components that have wires passing
through holes to the other side of the
board. You also have plastic components
that can’t be heated for soldering. Each
of these are handled separately in the
assembly process.
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MOTHERBOARDS
Create the mask
The soldering machines need to know which component goes where. For
this, the X,Y coordinates of each component are measured from the original
board design, and transferred to the machines. Now, when applying solder,
it shouldn’t spill outside the designated area, or the board would get spoilt.
So, a mask or stencil is created, which exposes just the areas on which the
solder has to be applied.
The PCB is
magnified for
capturing the X,Y
coordinates of the
various components
that need to be
mounted

The pasting machine. Solder paste

is applied on the board, preparing it
for soldering the small components

Apply the paste

As any electronics buff would
know, before you solder, you have
to apply soldering paste. Once the
stencil is applied, the board is
ready to take the soldering paste.
In this case, the paste also inclu-
des the solder. So, once you apply
the paste, put the component on,
and heat the board, the paste
melts and the solder gets applied.
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MOTHERBOARDS

Small components ahoy!

After the soldering paste is applied, the small components are mounted. Many of
these components are very small, and the bulk go on the board at this stage. So, the
process is very fast and precise. The mounting machine used at XO (called a placement
machine) has 16 cylinders with six heads on each. Each component has a unique
identification number and is fed in through feeder tubes. The machine picks up
components and places them on the assigned co-ordinates.
It isn’t time to apply the heat yet! For that, we have to wait for the large components
to go on board.

The placement machine and a close-up

of the mounting table. Above the board
on the mounting table, you can see the
mounting head. Each blue and yellow
head places one component on a
board. Depending on the size of the
component, the appropriate suction
head (the yellow part) is chosen
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MOTHERBOARDS
Large components, here we come!
Large components, for example, large capacitors and
ICs (Integrated Circuits), are mounted now. The
process is more precise and slower than the previous
one.
ICs can be of two types—QFP (Quad Flat Package),
where the silicon wafer has legs pointing out on four
sides, and BGA (Ball Grid Array), where the connectors
are in the shape of tiny balls. The QFP ICs are placed
on the allocated slots, while the BGA chip is placed on
a grid on the PCB.
The machine used here is a more precise version The large component placement machine
of the placement machine. It has two heads. The in action. The yellow light on the board
(first picture from left) is from the scanner
components can be fed in through feeder tubes or trays.
that aligns the head precisely. The close-up
shows the head placing a Ball Grid Array IC
on the board

PC QUEST u MAY 2000 u 47

 TECHNOLOGY
MOTHERBOARDS

Apply the heat

Time to apply the heat and solder the components. Unfortunately, we couldn’t
photograph this part, as it happens inside a closed environment. There’s a quick
visual check at this point to ensure that everything is okay.
What’s been heated has to be cooled, right? So, the board is now washed,
using jets of water that also cleans away extra solder, unsoldered components,
and other loose particles, if any.
Still to come are the even larger components that have to be placed by hand
and wave soldered.

The washing machine

Real biggies come now

The bigger components and those
made of plastic are mounted now. It’s
done manually on an assembly line type
of table. Components that go in now
include the slot raisers, ports, AMR
(Audio Modem Raiser), and power
connectors.
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MOTHERBOARDS
Wave soldering
The board is then wave soldered. It moves up an incline, with molten
solder flowing down in the opposite direction. The level of solder is
controlled, so that it doesn’t spill on the upper surface of the board,
and at the same time, doesn’t miss out any part of the lower surface.
The motherboard is now complete.

Testing times
The board is done. But is it ready? The
last part of the process is testing and
quality checks. Each board is put to test.
If the board passes the tests, it’s stamped,
packed in anti-static bags, and made
ready for shipping. If it fails, it’s passed
on to a second group of testers, who try
and salvage the board, correct errors, and
then send it back to the first group for re-
testing.

PCQ Labs with inputs from Varun

Talwar, Sanjay Shakdher and Manoj
Kumar Pant of XO Infotech