Concern for Intermetallic Thickness Growth in SAC Solder Joints in Harsh Service Environments
Folks, The service temperature for electronics in a modern automobile can be higher than 125C. These high temperatures raise the concern of copper-tin...
SAC Solder
Solder Technology Inside A Hot Car On A Sunny Summer Day
Here’s a true story regarding the service temperature of solder joints. Yesterday, as I left work, I noticed that it felt really hot outside. I ...
Alloy Melting
Folks, Richard asks: Dear Dr. Ron, Recently we had a solderability problem with tin-finished component leads and SAC305 solder paste. One of our...
Low Temperature Solders Slated to Leave Niche Status by 2017
Folks, It surprises many people that the foundation metal of almost all solder alloys is tin. Alloy elements such as lead, silver, copper, indi...
Low-Temperature Solders: Important, Valuable
New developments are happening almost daily in the electronics device world: phones that do much more than just convey voice, clothing that monitors a...
The Effect of Reflow Profiling on the Electrical Reliability of No-Clean Solder Paste Residues
At APEX 2014, I presented a paper about the effect that reflow profiling has on the SIR (Surface Insulation Resistance) performance (electrical reliab...
Alloy Density Calculator Generates Most Interest of All Blog Posts
Folks, In the nearly ten years that I have been blogging, I am continually surprised by the interest in a spreadsheet I created that calculates alloy ...
Dartmouth Student Asks Questions About SACm® Solder Alloy
Folks, Some years ago, a leading IC manufacturer decided that their R&D effort could benefit if analyzed for possible improvement – by hirin...
Calculating Solder Paste Usage
Many people try to determine the volume of solder paste that they will use on a given circuit board or during a full production run. Calculating...
Is the PC Dead?
Folks, Let’s see how Patty is recovering from her conflict with Hal Lindsay……. Patty saw a link on one of the daily SMT Tech new...
IMAPS 2013: International Symposium on Microelectronics
The 46th International Symposium on Microelectronics will be held in Orlando, Florida, September 30th through October 3rd, 2013. I will be attending b...
Thermal Cycling Performance of SACm® Pb-Free Solder Alloy
The development of SACm® lead-free solder alloy by Indium Corporation’s R&D team was focused around improving the mechanical shock perfo...