AirPods Orca CC connector automatic assembly line of a certain company

Consumer electronics products are iterating at a fast pace, and connectors and structural parts are becoming increasingly miniaturized and deformed, placing high demands on the accuracy, pace, and appearance protection of automation equipment. The AirPods Orca CC connector project revolves around the equipment needs of Apple's headphone charging box and the manufacturing needs of Luxshare precision connectors. MIJOINT Intelligence provides an automated assembly line for it, covering terminal Insert Molding, FUN Bridge, GND Bridge assembly, heat riveting, packaging and AOI inspection.

Project background

Orca CC connector is used for the contact terminal and CC pin of the AirPods charging box to complete the charging and communication of the left and right ears, and to transmit data synchronously. The product is small in size and has a precise structure. The housing has an irregular shape and is difficult to position. The PPT clearly mentioned that the stable assembly of the special-shaped Housing, IM and Bridge is the core difficulty of the project.

Consumer electronics connector manufacturing usually faces two simultaneous challenges: on the one hand, it must pursue high cycle times to meet mass production; on the other hand, it must protect the appearance of electroplated parts and precision structural parts to avoid defects such as scratches, bright marks, and deformation. The Orca CC project is a representative example of such difficult and precise assembly scenarios.

Automation solution

MIJOINT intelligently planned an automated assembly line for the Orca CC project. The equipment layout includes Housing Tray tray loading machine, Left IM assembly machine, Right IM assembly machine, FUN Bridge assembly machine, GND Bridge assembly machine and Tray tray packaging machine. The entire line reduces the number of manual product contacts through automatic loading, positioning, assembly, hot riveting, AOI inspection and packaging.

In the core assembly process, the project ensures accurate positioning of the special-shaped Housing through high-precision profiling clamp design, and uses a cam cutting assembly module to achieve stable assembly of the special-shaped IM and Bridge. For precision parts handling and high-frequency positioning, PPT also demonstrated a magnetic levitation transportation solution. The magnetic levitation system features high-speed start and stop, smooth speed regulation and high repeatability accuracy, which can reduce scratches caused by product handling.

Process Difficulties

The key difficulty of the Orca CC project is first of all the positioning of special-shaped parts. Traditional regular products can rely on simple clamps for positioning, while Orca CC’s HousingThe shape is irregular and the positioning reference is not intuitive. It is necessary to use profiling clamps and high-precision fixtures to ensure that every loading, clamping and assembly are stable.

The second is the deformation control of IM and Bridge. The PPT emphasizes that IM insertion does not allow deformation, Bridge does not allow deformation and scratches, and Housing appearance does not allow scratches or bright prints. Therefore, the equipment must not only be "loaded accurately", but also "loaded lightly", and the force and posture must be controlled during the clamping, handling, cutting and pressing processes.

The third is the balance between rhythm and appearance protection. The CT of PPT marking equipment is < 1.3s. It still has to complete the assembly, hot riveting, inspection and packaging of special-shaped parts at a high cycle time, which puts forward higher requirements for mechanical structure, control strategy and visual inspection.

Customer value

This project helps customers integrate multiple precision assembly steps of the AirPods charging box connector into automated production lines, reducing instability caused by manual operations. Through magnetic levitation conveying, profiling clamps, cam cutting assembly and AOI inspection, the project takes into account assembly accuracy and appearance protection in high-tempo production.

For the consumer electronics supply chain, automation is not only a tool to improve production capacity, but also the basis for ensuring the rapid introduction of new products and batch consistency. MIJOINT Intelligent has accumulated experience in automatic loading, positioning, assembly and inspection of special-shaped precision parts through the Orca CC project, which can be used in subsequent projects of similar connectors, structural parts and acoustic components.