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Greetings!
Welcome to the February issue of Residue News
| Upcoming Events |
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Foresite staff will be participating in some upcoming
industry events. See us at APEX in Las Vegas
Paco Solis will be presenting, "Metal
Whiskers - Does Surface Contamination Have Any Impact on
Whisker Formation?" at APEX in Las Vegas. Paco will be
presenting on April 1, 2009 at 9 a.m., section S14. He will
discuss the supporting evidence that shows localized levels of
contamination have an effect on the dissolution and stress
conditions that feed whisker formations. His presentation will
review some select failures due to metal whisker formations.
Eric Camden will be presenting,
"Cleanliness Failures - Pockets of Contamination that are
Causing Field Failures and How to Avoid Them for Leaded and
Lead-Free Processes," at APEX in Las Vegas. His
presentation will be on April 2, 2009 at 9 a.m., section S29.
Eric's presentation will look at today's smaller components,
particularly PQFNs, their processing parameters, material
choices and the effects of cleanliness. A case study of a
large failure will be presented along with solutions for how
to avoid potential disasters.
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| Meet the Problem |
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Foresite is regularly asked "what is the right test for
my problem?" or "what is the difference between analysis
technique A and analysis technique B?"
In an effort to address these questions, Terry Munson has
written a four part series for Circuits Assembly magazine
discussing FTIR, SEM/EDX, XRF, and IC (ion chromatography).
Each part of the series examines the analysis technique and
its pros and cons in regards to understanding electronics
residues.
The first part in the series was published in the November
issue, the subsequent issues contained the remaining three
parts.
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| Lee Flasche Has Joined the Foresite Staff |
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Foresite is pleased to announce the addition of Lee Flasche
to our staff.
Lee graduated from Ohio State University with a degree in
Welding Engineering (BSWE) in 1975. He is a life member of the
American Welding Society and currently a member of the AWS
Committee on Soldering. In addition, he has been a member and
chairman of several other Welding Society and Welding Research
Council committees. He has been awarded two United States
Patents. Lee has authored or co-authored numerous papers
concerning both high alloy materials and soldering technology.
His employment history includes work within the nuclear
power industry and the high alloy metals industry. His recent
employment includes ten years with Delphi Electronics and
Safety. Work experience there includes pressure transducer
manufacture, gold and aluminum wirebonding, and hybrid
(ceramic) circuit board manufacture. At the time of leaving
Delphi he was responsible for all FR4 rework/repair activities
worldwide.
As a project engineer at Foresite, he will provide
materials joining and metallurgical engineering expertise
concerning circuit board manufacturing. He will also be active
in our government-funded, lead-free tin whisker research
projects.
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Foresite Awarded Grant for Tin Whisker
Research |
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Tin Whisker growth
Foresite has been awarded a Small Business Technology
Transfer grant from the Missile Defense Agency of the U.S.
Department of Defense.
The government is painfully aware of the damage tin
whiskers can cause in and around electronics and the
increasing threat they pose as lead is removed from tin
alloys. We have seen empirical evidence that ionic residues
affect whisker nucleation and, possibly, growth. Together we
agree that the suspected correlation between residual
contaminants, especially from plating, and whiskers needs
research. Ultimately, Foresite's goal is a test method or even
test equipment to measure the proclivity of a surface to
suffer from whiskers. Material scientists at Purdue University
also agree on the potential of this research and will be
collaborating with us.
Stay tuned. |
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