Purpose Stencil cleaning is an important operation in solder paste printing process. Frequent cleaning may interrupt printing process and increase idle time, as well as loss for performing cleaning. This paper aims to propose a method to optimize the stencil cleaning time and reduce unnecessary cleaning operations and losses. Design/methodology/approach This paper uses a discrete-time, discrete-state homogeneous Markov chain to model the stencil printing performance degradation process, and the quality loss during the stencil printing process is estimated based on this degradation model. A stencil cleaning decision model based on renewal reward theorem is established, and the optimal cleaning time is obtained through a balance between quality loss and the loss on idle time. Findings A stencil cleaning decision model for solder paste printing is established, and numerical simulation results show that there exists an optimal stencil cleaning time which minimizes the long-term loss. Originality/value Stencil cleaning control is very important for solder paste printing. However, there are very few studies focusing on stencil cleaning control. This research contributes to developing a model to optimize the stencil cleaning time in solder paste printing process.

中文翻译：

---

一种优化锡膏印刷工艺中钢网清洗时间的方法

目的 钢网清洗是锡膏印刷过程中的一项重要操作。频繁清洁可能会中断打印过程并增加空闲时间，以及执行清洁的损失。本文旨在提出一种优化钢网清洗时间和减少不必要的清洗操作和损失的方法。设计/方法/途径 本文使用离散时间、离散状态的齐次马尔可夫链对模板印刷性能退化过程进行建模，并基于该退化模型估计模板印刷过程中的质量损失。建立了基于更新奖励定理的钢网清洗决策模型，通过平衡质量损失和空闲时间损失来获得最佳清洗时间。结果 建立了锡膏印刷的模板清洗决策模型，数值模拟结果表明存在一个最佳模板清洗时间，使长期损失最小化。原创性/价值 模板清洁控制对于锡膏印刷非常重要。然而，很少有研究关注钢网清洁控制。这项研究有助于开发一种模型，以优化锡膏印刷过程中的模板清洁时间。