Industrial sourcing · China to Europe

Buyer-firstOpen route · visible proof

Buyer guide · Electronics & assembly

SMT pick and place machine from China

The speed on a pick and place quote is measured on the seller's ideal board, and the listing may be a rebuilt branded mounter or a new Chinese build under the same words.

Ask about this machine ↗Where the numbers come from

Written and listings checked 30 September 2026. Every figure on this page names its source.

What you are actually comparing.

Two quotes, one machine name

What hides inside the price

Rated speed against your board

Components per hour is a best case with small chips and no nozzle changes. Ask the measurement basis, for example IPC-9850, and ask for a timed run of a board like yours.

New build or rebuilt brand

Thirteen of the 27 listings we checked named a Japanese, Korean or German brand and eleven said used. A rebuilt mounter can be a fair buy if you get its year, hours and the list of replaced heads and cameras.

Feeder slots and feeder price

Every unique part number needs a feeder. Count slots, ask which feeder widths are included, and price spares now. Feeders for rebuilt brands and new Chinese machines do not interchange.

Vision and part range

Ask the smallest chip and largest IC the cameras handle, and whether fine-pitch parts get a bottom camera check.

Programming and software licence

Can it import your centroid file, or is every part taught by hand? Ask the screen language and who holds the licence if the seller disappears.

Before you ask for a price.

Send these with the enquiry. Without them, any number a factory gives you is a guess dressed as a quotation.

Your bill of materials: smallest and largest package, and the mix of reels, trays and tubes.
Unique part numbers per board, because this decides feeder slots more than speed does.
Board and panel size, and whether parts sit on both sides.
Boards per shift and how often the product changes.
The centroid and CAD file formats your design team exports.

Turn the claim into a demonstration.

Require this	A pass looks like
Run your own board program on a counted batch of your panels, with your reels loaded.	Every placement checked against the drawing, defects counted, and real cycle time per panel recorded.
Load a reel with a wrong part or reversed polarity into one feeder.	The vision system rejects the part and the machine stops or discards it instead of placing it.
Change a reel and a nozzle during the run, timed.	Changeover time recorded; the next board places without re-teaching parts.

The documents that must arrive with it.

EU Declaration of Conformity citing 2006/42/EC, or Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 for delivery from 20 January 2027, plus Low Voltage 2014/35/EU and EMC 2014/30/EU.
Manual in the language of the country of use, with feeder, nozzle and camera part numbers, plus the software version and a backup of the installed program.
For a rebuilt machine: serial number, year of manufacture and a list of parts replaced.

The one people forget. Who signs the declaration for a rebuilt machine. The brand's original paperwork described the machine years ago. Get the name of whoever takes responsibility for the rebuild on the declaration before you pay.

When this is the wrong machine.

Buy something else if

Named, not hedged

You build prototypes or a few boards a week.

A small desktop placer with hand-loaded strips, or a contract assembler who already runs a line.

Your boards carry many unique parts and change daily, and the quoted machine has few feeder slots.

A machine with more slots and feeder trolleys for offline setup, even at a lower rated speed.

Where the numbers come from.

We name the kind of source, how many and when, and never the factory. Listed prices are asking prices, not landed cost. Where we do not hold a fact we say so: that is a GAP, not an estimate.

Listings · 27Twenty-seven marketplace listings for SMT pick and place machines, checked September 2026: thirteen named a Japanese, Korean or German placement brand in the title, and eleven stated used condition.
Listings · 27The same 27 listings advertised asking prices from US$999 to US$600,000, a spread that mixes desktop units, rebuilt mounters and complete lines. These are asking prices, not landed cost.
GAPGAP - no supplier quotations logged for this machine yet. Three to five quotations for one configuration would give a real price spread.

Related machines.

Solder paste stencil printer. Choose the stencil printer page first if your defects start before placement, since most joint faults begin at the paste.
Reflow oven. Read the reflow oven page when planning the whole line, because oven length sets how fast placed boards leave it.

Every machine we source in this area is on the Electronics & assembly page. How a project runs, stage by stage, is on how it works, and what it costs is on pricing.

Straight answers

Questions buyers ask about this machine.

Chinese vs European SMT pick and place machine: what is the real difference?+

Heads and cameras differ less than the price does. The gap is service, feeder supply and software support in Europe. A rebuilt branded mounter from China sits between: known hardware, rebuild risk on you.

What belongs on an SMT pick and place inspection checklist?+

The three tests above, camera and head serial numbers against the invoice, and a count of feeders by width against the pro forma.

What CE documentation does a pick and place machine need?+

A Declaration of Conformity naming its directives and standards, the technical file behind it, and a manual in your language. A CE mark in a brochure proves nothing.

Who is the EU importer of a pick and place machine?+

If you import it yourself, you are: check the documents exist, put your name and address on the machine or its papers, and keep the declaration for the authorities.

Contact

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Send a machine, a quotation you want checked, or a question. We reply with what we would look at first.