Electronics Manufacturing Technical Articles

Electronics Manufacturing Technical Articles

Papers and articles related to SMT, PCB & EMS industry.


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1882 SMT / PCB Assembly Related Technical Articles

Tin Whiskers: Risks with Lead Free | Part I

Jun 19, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

Tin (Sn) metal displays the characteristic of growing “tin whiskers” from pure tin coatings (most actively on relatively thin, electrodeposited or immersion tin coatings), usually months or years from the initial deposition of the tin. Tin whiskers are electrically conductive, filamentary, single crystals of white (beta phase) tin. These filaments of single crystal tin are usually one to five microns in diameter, and a few microns up to several tens of millimeters long, that grow spontaneously from the tin coatings. Alloying additions of several percent (by weight) of lead (Pb) prevents these electrically conductive tin whiskers from growing. Pb alloyed into the Sn was discovered to prevent the occurrence of tin whiskers in electronic assemblies in the 1950s as the Bell Laboratories solution to the problem of tin whiskers. The alloying of the tin with lead has thus quietly averted incalculable losses from short circuits in electronic equipment for the last 60 years....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

Use of Pelseal® 2078 Viton® Caulk in Decapsulation of Electronics Components

Jun 18, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies is tasked with decapsulation of electronics components for testing and investigative purposes. In the normal method of decapsulation, an analyst will drill a small indentation, with a rotary tool, in the hermetic sealant material and then apply Nitric acid to eat through the polymeric encapsulant....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

The climatic test chamber after-sale service

Jun 18, 2019 | climatest symor

After-sale service Climatest Symor® strictly controls every production procedure,our main after-sale service procedure is as follow: 1) Email Climatest Symor® about the fault description(Pictures or video is preferred) 2) Within 1 working days, Climatest Symor® gives feedback or solution (If Climatest Symor® needs customer to take pictures about some parts of the machine, customer should cooperate accordingly to settle issues. 3) If checked that some parts(except glass nozzle) is possible broken by non-artificial reason, If necessary, customer deliver the broken part to Climatest Symor®, later Climatest Symor® send the repaired part or new part to customer. If unnecessary, Climatest Symor® will make delivery for the new part to customer directly. Remark:During warranty, Climatest Symor® is responsible for delivery fees both ways and parts fees.After warranty, Customer is responsible for the delivery fees both ways,Climatest Symor® will provide the parts to customer by cost price....

Publisher: Symor Instrument Equipment Co.,Ltd

Symor Instrument Equipment Co.,Ltd

Climatest Symor® is the leading environmental simulation testing equipment manufacturer in China established in 2001, located at Dayang Industrial Park,Hefei,China.

Hefei, China

Manufacturer

Fiducial Marks

Jun 17, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

Very often pick and place machines are programmed using CAD data. This data increases the accuracy, precision, and repeatability of its component placement objectives. CAD data makes fine pitch and small component assemblies repeatable, but cannot adjust to a particular board unless it is exactly the same size and shape of the original board used for programming. The process by which printed circuit boards (PCBs) are made only allows some minor changes inboard size and shape, but these small differences are enough for parts to be misplaced. For this reason we use fiducial marks to increase the chances of precise component alignment....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

IPX3 IPX4 IPX5 IPX6 IPX9K Water Spray Test Chamber

Jun 17, 2019 | climatest symor

Water spray test chamber dedicates to test and evaluate the protection degree to water resistance provided by product enclosure,the protection level against water ingress is called IP code....

Publisher: Symor Instrument Equipment Co.,Ltd

Symor Instrument Equipment Co.,Ltd

Climatest Symor® is the leading environmental simulation testing equipment manufacturer in China established in 2001, located at Dayang Industrial Park,Hefei,China.

Hefei, China

Manufacturer

BGA Placement on Rework Station

Jun 12, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

The success of ball grid array (BGA) placement on electronic assemblies is as much a matter of proper preparation and planning, as it is technique. In some designs, it is more appropriate to apply BGAs using a rework station that isolates the placement of the device, without subjecting the entire assembly to thermal reflow. This is especially beneficial in board constructions where the number of BGAs is limited, and the application of the solder paste is difficult, due to small pitch features that stretch the limitation of the stencil construction. Another application for rework stations, involves very large and thermally conductive BGAs, which will not uniformly reflow with other components on the assembly, and may require special process parameters for their proper placement. The most common use of BGA rework stations are for assemblies requiring BGA removal and replacements due to failures in the initial assembly stage....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

Reflow Experiment

Jun 11, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

An experiment was recently performed ACI Technologies for a customer that was interested in comparing the wetting of lead-free solders with varying temperature profiles and atmospheric conditions. In order to deliver an objective measurement of solder wetting (in addition to subjective inspection analysis), a simple wetting indicator pattern was added to the solder stencil in an area on the test vehicle that had exposed and unused copper....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

Component Failure Analysis - Hermetic Packaging

Jun 11, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

Recently ACI Technologies was asked to perform failure analysis on a hermetically sealed transistor for potential electrostatic discharge (ESD) or electrostatic overstress (EOS). ACI was asked to determine if the field-failed transistor was damaged by ESD or EOS. In order to properly assess the failure, additional samples were requested....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

What is UV weathering test chamber

Jun 10, 2019 | climatest symor

UV-Lamp Weathering Test Chamber takes fluorescent UV lamps as light source to simulate the UV irradiation in natural light and condensation to conduct accelerated weathering test on the materials, It simulates UV, rain, high temperature, humidity, condensation, darkness and other environmental conditions, combine them together, and carry them out automatically. ...

Publisher: Symor Instrument Equipment Co.,Ltd

Symor Instrument Equipment Co.,Ltd

Climatest Symor® is the leading environmental simulation testing equipment manufacturer in China established in 2001, located at Dayang Industrial Park,Hefei,China.

Hefei, China

Manufacturer

Surface Finish Issues Affecting Solderability and Reliability

Jun 07, 2019 | ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies was contacted in regards to poor solder joint reliability. The customer submitted an assembly that was exhibiting intermittent opens at multiple locations on a ball grid array (BGA) component. The assembly’s functionality did not survive international shipping, essentially shock and vibration failures, immediately making the quality of the solder joints suspect. The customer was asked about the contract manufacturer and the reflow oven profile as well as the solder paste and surface finish used. The ACI engineering staff evaluated the contract manufacturer’s technique and determined that they were competent in the methods they used for placing thermocouples in the proper locations and developing the reflow oven profile. The surface finish was unusual, but not unheard of, in that it was hard gold over hard nickel, rather than electroless nickel immersion gold (ENIG). The customer was able to supply boundary scan testing data which showed a diagonal row of troublesome BGA pins....

Publisher: ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI Technologies, Inc.

ACI, an authorized IPC Training Center operating the National Electronics Manufacturing Center of Excellence providing analytical testing, manufacturing and repair services to the electronics industry.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Consultant / Service Provider, Standards Setting / Certification, Training Provider

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