Durable PCB Labels for SMT Reflow in Electronics

High Temperature Polyimide PCB Labels for SMT Reflow

High Temperature, Polyimide labels are common place for labelling of PCBs in SMT electronics manufacturing today and these very durable labels are incredibly resilient to the thermal demands of modern lead-free SMT reflow processes. These labels now often have little or no text, instead a 2D Data Matrix or QR barcode containing critical product, batch, lot, revision and serial number data.

When selecting a polyimide label material it is critical to match a high temperature resin ribbon to ensure the label not only remains on the PCB but also that the text remains legible through the entire SMT process. This provides traceability throughout the entire production process and can be read easily by all the key SMT machines to record data for every stage of the manufacturing process.

For the SMT reflow stage this is fairly straightforward and we have a range of polyimide label materials, sizes and resin ribbons to suit all applications and thermal transfer printers.

Our Thermal Transfer Ribbon – Application Guide will help you identify the best combination for your application and budget.

Cleaning Resistant PCB Labels

When a polyimide PCB label need to be routed through multiple processes; SMT Reflow, Wave Solder, Selective Solder and additional Cleaning Stages you should fully test your labels to make sure they remain stuck and legible right through the entire combination of processing. For a truly durable label, both the printed quality and resistance of the printed image when exposed to chemicals and abrasion is essential.

Finding your label or printing survives everything but the final PCB Cleaner stage will be very frustrating, and will leave your products untraceable, and your cleaner full of labels.

Contact us today to discuss your PCB labelling application and request samples for testing through your entire process.

Our Link Labels will travel through all SMT & Wave processes, and survive the cleaning process, not matter how tough you think it might be.

We offer a pre-printing service for lower volume applications and for new users, allowing the process to be developed before making the investment of a thermal transfer printer, labelling software to allow printing yourselves.

We also offer both traditional manually applied labels and Auto-Apply SMT Feeder and applicator labels, designed for higher volume applications – placing the label like a component.