How Does the Vacuum Feature Affect My Paper Choice?

The vacuum feature on your stencil printing machine improves the quality of the printing process because it sucks excess solder paste out of the apertures. This means fewer misprinted boards, fewer rejects, fewer change-outs and less downtime, all of which result in more boards per hour. However, if the cleaning paper is not sufficiently porous the vacuum feature will not be effectively remove the paste from of the apertures and print quality will suffer.

To make the vacuum process work, you need a paper that is more porous than the original stencil wiping paper. If you tried old-style rolls on a vacuum system, the vacuum would not be able to pull enough air through the paper to operate effectively. So a more porous and open paper was required.

Today MicroCare offers a special vacuum paper for all of the major printing systems, including DEK, EKRA, Panasonic, MPM and others. The MicroWipe™ FP fabric is specifically engineered for fine-pitch stencil work. This fabric also works extremely well on vacuum systems. We strongly recommend you consider the MicroWipe™ FP paper which will work better than anything else on the market today.