Technical Library | 2007-08-16 13:34:31.0
While experienced inspectors may be able to determine the aesthetic differences between a lead-free PCB assembly and a tin-lead version, one cannot rely on the "experienced eye". "Less wetting out to the pad edges" (Figure A) and "graininess and lack of shininess of the solder joint" (Figure B) are typical comments about some lead-free solder joints. However, in cases where a Nitrogen atmosphere was present during the reflow of the solder joint (Figure C), there will be little visual differences between the lead free alloys and their tin-lead counterparts.
Technical Library | 2021-03-10 23:57:29.0
Latent short circuit failures have been observed during testing of Printed Circuit Boards (PCB) for power distribution of spacecraft of the European Space Agency. Root cause analysis indicates that foreign fibers may have contaminated the PCB laminate. These fibers can provide a pathway for electromigration if they bridge the clearance between nets of different potential in the presence of humidity attracted by the hygroscopic laminate resin. PCB manufacturers report poor yield caused by contamination embedded in laminate. Inspections show ...
Technical Library | 2012-05-31 23:35:31.0
Industrial network security solutions essential to today's PLC - SCADA security. Lack of security on an industrial network could cause a serious threat to the system, to the personnel involved in it, in fact, production machines networks without proper se
Technical Library | 2009-11-05 11:17:32.0
Head-in-pillow (HiP), also known as ball-and-socket, is a solder joint defect where the solder paste deposit wets the pad, but does not fully wet the ball. This results in a solder joint with enough of a connection to have electrical integrity, but lacking sufficient mechanical strength. Due to the lack of solder joint strength, these components may fail with very little mechanical or thermal stress. This potentially costly defect is not usually detected in functional testing, and only shows up as a failure in the field after the assembly has been exposed to some physical or thermal stress.
Technical Library | 1999-05-07 10:04:13.0
Powerful desktop multiprocessor systems based on the Intel Architecture (iA) offer a formidable alternative to traditional scientific/engineering workstations for commercial application developers at an attractive costperformance ratio. However, the lack of adequate compiler and runtime library support for multithreading and parallel processing on Windows NT* makes it difficult or impossible to fully exploit the performance advantage of these multiprocessor systems. In this paper we describe the design, development, and initial performance results of the Illinois-Intel Multithreading Library (IML), which aims at providing an efficient and powerful (in terms of types of parallelism it supports) API for multithreaded application developers.
Technical Library | 2018-05-23 12:12:43.0
Driven by miniaturization, cost reduction and tighter requirements for electrical and thermal performance, the use of lead-frame based bottom-termination components (LF-BTC) as small-outline no-leads (SON), quad-flat no leads (QFN) packages etc., is increasing. However, a major distractor for the use of such packages in high-reliability applications has been the lack of a visible solder (toe) fillet on the edge surface of the pins: because the post-package assembly singulation process typically leaves bare copper leadframe at the singulation edge, which is not protected against oxidation and thus does not easily solder-wet, a solder fillet (toe fillet) does not generally develop.
Technical Library | 2013-08-13 09:49:53.0
One of the common issues I’ve noticed when visiting shops that use crimp force monitors (CFMs) is that the CFMs are usually turned off, regardless of the brand, because engineers and operators are not using them properly. Why, with all of their benefits, are CFMs not being used regularly by employees? One of the biggest problems is the lack of understanding of the variables affecting the CFM’s ability to detect variations. Crimp quality detection is similar to baking a cake. There are a lot of ingredients and if one ingredient is missing or of bad quality, you likely are not going to achieve your desired result. This article will go back through the basics of a crimp quality detection system and discuss what ingredients or variables you need to consider before switching off that CFM.
Technical Library | 2019-12-18 23:28:07.0
Electronic tongue systems equipped with cross-sensitive potentiometric sensors have been applied to pharmaceutical analysis, due to the possibility of various applications and developing new formulations. Many studies already proved the complementarity between the electronic tongue and classical analysis such as dissolution tests indicated by Pharmacopeias. However, as a new approach to study pharmaceuticals, electronic tongues lack strict testing protocols and specification limits; therefore, their results can be improperly interpreted and inconsistent with the reference studies. Therefore, all aspects of the development, measurement conditions, data analysis, and interpretation of electronic tongue results were discussed in this overview. The critical evaluation of the effectiveness and reliability of constructed devices may be helpful for a better understanding of electronic tongue systems development and for providing strict testing protocols.
Technical Library | 2021-06-02 19:39:14.0
With an estimated value creation potential for manufacturers and suppliers of USD 3.7 trillion in 2025,1 high hopes are set on Industry 4.0 to bring the next industrial revolution to discrete manufacturing. Yet, only about 30 percent of companies are capturing value from Industry 4.0 solutions at scale today. Approaches are dominated by envisioning technology development going forward rather than identifying areas of largest impact and tracking it back to Industry 4.0 value drivers. Further governance and organizational anchoring are often unclear. Resulting hurdles related to a lack of clarity regarding business value, limited resources, and an overwhelming number of potential use cases leave the majority of companies stuck in "pilot purgatory."
Technical Library | 2011-10-06 13:59:04.0
The desire to have more functionality into increasingly smaller size end products has been pushing the PCB and IC Packaging industry towards High Density Interconnect (HDI) and 3D Packaging (stacked dies, embedded packaged components). Many companies in the high-end consumer electronics market place have been embedding passive chip components on inner PCB and IC Packages for a few years now. However, embedding packaged components on inner layers has remained elusive for the broader market due to lack of proper design tools and high cost of embedding components on inner layers (...) This paper will highlight several key industrialization aspects addressed in the frame of the European funded FP7 HERMES* project to build a manufacturing environment for products with embedded components. The program entered its third year and is now dealing with the manufacturing of functional demonstrators as an introduction to industrialization.
