Where the Time Actually Goes
It is easy to specify a tester on test time and then lose the gain somewhere else. If a board is loaded, aligned and unloaded by hand, the machine spends a good share of every cycle waiting for a person, and your throughput is set by how fast that person can work rather than by the tester you bought.
Automating the handling closes that gap. Boards feed from a rack, the tester runs continuously, and the operator loads racks instead of boards — which frees them for work that actually needs a person.
The usual objection is space. Traditional automation wants a cell's worth of floor, which is exactly what most shops do not have spare. That is the problem this equipment was designed around. As sole UK and Ireland distributor for SPEA since 2004, we can work out whether it fits your cell before anything is ordered.
Keep the Tester Testing
The handling equipment loads boards and devices from rack to tester, and returns them from tester to rack, without intervention. The tester works through a rack rather than pausing between every board.
It integrates with any conveyor-loading tester SPEA makes — systems already on your floor as readily as new ones — so automating handling does not mean replacing the tester you have. Taking both from one manufacturer also removes the integration risk that usually comes with bolting third-party automation onto test equipment.
Automation That Fits the Floor You Have
The smallest handling module occupies 0.70m². A typical pass-through configuration takes 1.31m² against 3.38m² for traditional automation — roughly a third of the floor, which is often the difference between a project going ahead and being shelved.
Rack positioning can be manual or automatic, fed by AGV, robot, conveyor or local magazine buffer, and the positioning height is programmable — so it suits an operator loading racks by hand today and a robot handover later, without changing the equipment.
Reconfigure Rather Than Replace
The architecture is modular. Modules can be added, swapped or moved between test cells, and the loading mode changed between pass-back, pass-through and mixed. A cell set up for this year's production can be rearranged for next year's rather than written off.
That matters when you are committing to automation without knowing exactly what your product mix looks like in three years. You are buying a configuration you can change, not one you have to live with.
No Operator Intervention on Product Change
Installation is deliberately plain: mains, then the tester communication ports — SMEMA, Hermes or TCP/IP. The drivers are already part of the SPEA testers' operating system, so there is nothing further to integrate.
Operating mode is set inside the test program, which means a product changeover needs no intervention at the handler at all. The test program can also decide how tested boards are arranged in the output rack, including sorting pass and fail into dedicated slots or separate racks — so downstream sorting is handled before anyone touches the boards.
Because the equipment is controlled by the tester's operating system and connected over Ethernet TCP/IP, working and sensor data can be passed to your systems — making predictive maintenance possible rather than waiting for something to stop.
Configuration & Interfaces
Loading modes, rack feeds and tester interfaces supported by the handling equipment.
Pass-Through
Pass-Back
Mixed Mode
Rack to Tester
Tester to Rack
AGV Feed
Robot Loading
Conveyor Feed
Local Magazine Buffer
Programmable Rack Height
SMEMA
Hermes
Ethernet TCP/IP
Pass/Fail Sorting
Predictive Maintenance