Elevator Manufacturing Helped by ABI Electronics

Customer: Brazilian Elevator Manufacturing Plant

Problem:

-          New electronic cards are assembled by third party companies and shipped to elevator manufacturer in the south of Brazil.

-          The end of production test carried out by the automatic test equipment (ATE) is slow and gives little information about the fault location if PCB fails the test.

-          Operators have to follow traditional work instructions and instrumentation (PSU, scopes, multimeter) which is time-consuming and ineffective.

-          The test area became a bottleneck and PCBs are being scrapped when faults are not found quickly.

-          Similar problems being faced by manufacturer's offices in Chile, Argentina and Mexico which rely on R&D team in Brazil for advice.

Solution:

-          ABI distributor approached test managers earlier this year

-          Customer presented the situation above and showed interested in having the existing process replaced by SYSTEM 8 Modules and TestFlow

-          Manufacturer's test managers travelled to Sao Paulo to watch a demonstration from RCBI and to visit other ABI customers in the region

-          ABI introduced the following scenario to be implemented at the third party PCB manufacturer (CEM):

o   ABI hardware (BoardMaster) could be connected to an interface card (designed by mfr) populated with relays that would switch on/off according to logic patters output by the ATM module

o   The interface card would be linked to other modules (eg. AMS, MIS 4, VPS) and a test fixture (bed of nails) developed for most critical PCB designs

o   A sequence including Power Off and Power On tests would be set up using the TestFlow Manager.

o   A detailed report would be generated including any fault information. The report would be submitted to the R&D for analysis and operators could run a component level test to troubleshoot most expensive PCBs.

o   This setup could also be put in place by other elevator plants in Latin America

Outcome:

A group of 5 test engineers evaluated the proposal from ABI and presented the project to the company’s directors. An initial investment was approved and the order has been placed with ABI.

Products purchased: 2x 7 Bay BoardMaster with ATM, 2x AMS, AICT, MIS 4 and VPS plus accessories.