MaterialPackage Class

There is material in the factory where not each material unit is identifiable. This is the case for Trays for example. Trays are delivered as a batch of trays. But each tray does not have a unique ID, only the batch of trays has a unique ID. In this case, we assume that the unique Batch ID is in the property BatchID and each tray which is been mounted will get a temporary UniqueIdentifier as long as it is been mounted on the machine. See BatchMaterialPackage for more details.

This field specify the parent batch material unit representing the complete batch. The BatchMaterialPackagecan be queried the quantity as well as other properties for the whole batch. This data is only set, when the events are send out of the line level verification system. This property can not be set via the interface.

This specifies the grey zone between 2 material packages. A grey zone is a zone where the placement system can not determine where the switch between 2 material packages has been taken place. Therefore the system tracks both material packages. The quality of the GreyZone is driven by the process the customer is operating and if the feeder are using optional splice sensor detectors or not. Background is, that some sensors can detect the splice plate and the splice plate has a length which covers a number of components which hide the real end of tape. Therefore the verifcation system will report a greyzone between the "leading package" and the "trailing" in the chain. The greyzone will be maintained typically by the machine, based on the feeder configuration. When the feeder has a sploice sensor the grey zone will be calculated when the sensor detects the splice, and will be adjusted when components are consumed. When the greyzone reached zero, the "leading" package will be consumed and the chain will be modified by removing the "leading" package from the chain, resulting in the next package in the chain becoming the new "leading" package.

When the placement machine is using tape material the operator can splice a new tape onto the existing material. This will lead to a chain of material. Physically the existing reel with the barcode will be separated from the already mounted tape and a new tape with its reel will be appended to the material. This leads to the situation that the material chain can only be identified by the newest material added to the chain (known as the "trailing" material package) using the barcode on its reel. Typically the placement machine is consuming from the "leading" package of the chain. So the assumption is that we may build a chain B->A by splicing B to A, where A is the "leading" material package (consumed first), and B is the "trailing" material package (consumed last). In this situation, the chain will be identified only by the barcode of B, and the MaterialPackage structure of B will have its LeadingMaterialPackage property set to A. It should be noted that it is possible and permissible to form chains of more than 2 material packages. In this situation, each material package in the chain will have the LeadingMaterialPackage property set to the next package in the chain (with the exception of the material package that is currently being consumed (the "leading" material package).