Hello!

I have designed a small board with mixed SMD and TH components,
with both SMD and TH components only on top.

Now I face the difficulties of mounting about 100 components for
each board. It takes me a couple of days (!) for each board, which
is too much.

I can make excellent solder joints but it takes time! For the SMD
(from 0603 on) I use a flux pen, I wet the PCB, place the component
on, solder one terminal using a small spoon-like tip, then apply
flux again, solder the other(s) pin, then apply flux again on the
first one and resolder it to get a nicer, perfect joint. The result
is perfect (probably better than what is done by automated machines)
but it takes too much work and time.

For the TH hole parts, I noticed it takes much more time than the
SMD ones! So I first tried to move as many TH components to SMD
technology, but there are some which is impossibile to "convert",
e.g. transistors that take less board space in TH form because
they extend vertically (this is a space advantage of TH vs SMD
in some cases!), so I have about 30 TH components left that I have
to solder manually.

It takes a lot of time.. like 5 or more seconds to solder a joint,
but then on the opposite side of the PTH board often the solder
doesn't rise well and I have to resolder the opposite side too.
I have to use the flux pen on 2 sides of the board now, and as
the components are larger than the SMD ones, it takes even more
time anyway. Because of check here, resolder there, fix that, oh
shit I filled a hole there, etc.. it takes even 10 minutes for
each component in the end!

As I wanna assemble a small serie (100's) of my hobbyst product
by hand I need to be more productive else I will have to raise the
sale price in an unacceptable way.

So I thought about various possibilities to become more productive,
that I'd like you pros to evaluate if possible:

1) get at least the SMD parts done by a third party company.
I will provide the gerber files for the PCB, the coordinates file
for their pick 'n' place machine, and they'll make me the boards (half
completed) for a convenient price, sourcing the components (mostly
resistors and capacitors 0603,0805,1206) by themselves. So I buy their
boards, in practice. Then I add the missing parts (as few as possible)
and voil=E0.
I will thus add by hand the most expensive components (if anything
because I already bought them and I don't wanna waste them) and
those components (TH?) which cannot be automatized.
Can you suggest me some companies that would make the PCB and source
and mount most of the components for me, at a reasonable price? I am
located in the EU, I specify this because customs may otherwise turn
a convenient company into one that is not.

I have a self made oven and even stencils for this board, but then
again the time it takes to pick and place manually the components
is huge and I ended up soldering by hand, also because when you use
stencils, etc.. there are even more errors you can do and to correct
them takes a lot of time and stress. So I think that the only really
productive solution would be the 1) above, i.e. get the board partially
made by someone else which has nice automated machines to do it and
can do it at a very convenient price. Yes but what company?

2) for the TH, would applying flux cream and using a solder pot a
working solution to get a lot of solder work done at once? Theoretically
this would be a great solution I thought.. but will it work? Will it
affect the other SMD components already soldered on top of the board?

The board has both SMD and TH components only on top.

Thanks for any insights!

Greetings,
Mario

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