Research Progress on the Solder Joint Reliability of Electronics Using in Deep Space Exploration

The spacecraft for deep space exploration missions will face extreme environments,including cryogenic temperature,intense radiation,wide-range temperature variations and even the combination of conditions mentioned above.Harsh environments will lead to solder joints degradation or even failure,resulting in damage to onboard electronics.The research activities on high reliability solder joints using in extreme environments can not only reduce the use of onboard protection devices,but effectively improve the overall reliability of spacecraft,which is of great significance to the aviation industry.In this paper,we review the reliability research on SnPb solder alloys,Sn-based lead-free solder alloys and In-based solder alloys in extreme environments,and try to provide some suggestions for the follow-up studies,which focus on solder joint reliability under extreme environments.

Study on solder joint reliability of ceramic ball grid array component based on design of experiment method

Four process parameters, pad diameter, stencil thickness, ball diameter and stand-off were chosen as four control factors. By using an L25 （5^6 ） orthogonal array the ceramic ball grid array （ CBGA ） solder joints which have 25 different combinations of process parameters were designed. The numerical models of all the 25 CBGA solder joints were developed using the Sugrace Evolver. Utilizing the sugrace coordinate exported from the 25 CBGA solder joints numerical models, the finite element analysis models were set up and the nonlinear finite element analysis of the CBGA solder joints under thermal cycles were pegrormed by ANSYS. The thermal fatigue life of CBGA solder joint was calculated using Coffin-Manson equation. Based on the calculated thermal fatigue life results, the range analysis and the variance analysis were pegrormed. The results show that the fatigue life of CBGA solder joint is affected by the pad diameter, the stencil thickness, the ball diameter and the stand-off in a descending order, the best combination of process parameters results in the longest fatigue life is 0.07 mm stand-off, 0.125 mm stencil thickness of, 0.85 mm ball diameter and 0. 89 mm pad diameter. With 95% confidence the pad diameter has a significant effect on the reliability of CBGA solder joints whereas the stand-off, the stencil thickness and the ball diameter have little effect on the reliability of CBGA solder joints.

QUICK ASSESSMENT METHODOLOGY FOR RELIABILITY OF SOLDER JOINTS IN BALL GRID ARRAY (BGA) ASSEMBLY——PART Ⅰ: CREEP CONSTITUTIVE RELATION AND FATIGUE MODEL

In this study, a new unified creep constitutive relation and a mod- ified energy-based fatigue model have been established respectively to describe the creep flow and predict the fatigue life of Sn-Pb solders. It is found that the relation successfully elucidates the creep mechanism related to current constitutive relations. The model can be used to describe the temperature and frequency dependent low cycle fatigue behavior of the solder. The relation and the model are further employed in part Ⅱ to develop the numerical simulation approach for the long-term reliability assessment of the plastic ball grid array (BGA) assembly.

Experimental and Finite Element Method Studies of J-Lead Solder Joint Reliability

A comprehensive experimental and numerical study of solder joints for plastic leaded chip carrier (PLCC) 84-Pin, 1.27 mm pitch was carried out. The reliability of solder joints was assessed through accelerated thermal cycling at the temperature range of - 55℃-125℃. The samples were taken out to observe the evolution in microstructure, such as grain coarsening, initiation and propagation of cracks. It was found that the Pb-rich phases segregated gradually and formed a continuous layer adjacent to the intermetallic compound (IMC) layer with increasing the number of thermal cycles, resulting in cracks near the solder/lead interface. The response of stress and strain was studied using nonlinear finite element method (FEM), and the results agreed well with the experimental data.

An exPerimental study of effect of solder joint geometry on thermal cycle life in SMT

The geometry of solder joint in SMT is one of the important factors whichdetermine the solder joint reliability. In this study, a type of solder joint specimen has beendesigned and is subjected to thermal cycling to failure between -55 ℃ to +125 ℃ with a 36℃/min heating and cooling rate and 10 min temperature holding times. The solder jointgeometry is castellated and controlled with different solder fillet shape and stand off height.A statistical analysis of the scattered thermal cycle lives of solder joints by two parameterWeibull's probability density function has been carried out in this paper. The experimentalresults show that the more reliable solder joint geometry has flat or slight convex solderfillet with a stand off height larger than 0.1 mm. The results may be the recommendedguideline to design optimal solder joint geometry.

THE DESIGN OF AN INTEGRATED SYSTEM FOR PREDICTING AND ANALYZING SOLDER JOINT SHAPE AND RELIABILITY INSMT

Solder joint reliability is one of critical problems detemining whether Sirface Mount Technology (SMT) can be used in the prohotion of important electronic products. Optimizing solder joint shape is one of effective ways to improve SMT solder joint reliability.In this paper. based on the theorem of minimum potential energy, an energy model of 3 - D solder joint shape is established,and the forma- tion of solder joint is numerically simulated by Surface Ecolver program. On the basis of the prediction of SMT solder joint shape,the mechanical model of analyzing solder joint reliability is established. An elasto - plasto - creep mateial model and its mechanical constitutive equaton are established for SnPb solder alloy, and the stress/strain response of SMT solder joint under thermal cyclical loabing is ana- lyzed with nonlinear 3 - D FEM. The fatigue life of solder joint is predicted according to Coffin- Manson fatigue life model. An integrated system for Predicting and analyzing SMT solder joint shape and reliability(PSAR) is developed.The system can analyze efficiently SMT solder joint reliability with the variation of structural parameters in the joint and give the optimal structure.

Design of a visual system for predicting SMT solder joint shape

A visual software system has been developed for predicting and analyzing the shape of solder joints in surface mount technology (SMT). The formation of the solder joint is numerically simulated through Surface Evolver program and the calculation is automated with an additional controller. A preprocessor is developed in which process parameters determining the shape of solder joints can be input visually and transferred into Evolver program automatically. A postprocessor is built to analyze the global three dimensional shape and cross section profiles of solder fillets in multiple windows. Also, the application for predicting the solder joint shape of RC chip component is conducted with the PSJS system.

Finite element simulation for mechanical response of surface mounted solder joints under different temperature cycling

Nonlinear finite element simulation for mechanical response of surface mounted solder joint under different temperature cycling was carried out. Seven sets of parameters were used in order to evaluate the influence of temperature cycling profile parameters. The results show that temperature cycling history has significant effect on the stress response of the solder joint. Based on the concept of relative damage stress proposed by the authors, it is found that enough high temperature holding time is necessary for designing the temperature cycling profile in accelerated thermal fatigue test.

Evolution of AuSnx intermetallic compounds in laser reflowed micro-solder joints

To investigate the effect of Au thickness on evolution of AuSnx IMCs, pads with 0. 1, 0. 5 and 4. 0 μm thickness of Au surface finish were utilized. Laser reflowed solder joints were aged in 125℃ isothermal ovens. Results indicated that little IMC formed at the interface of solder and pad with 0. 1 μm thickness of Au. Even in condition of 744 hours aging, thickness of lMCs did not increase obviously. As for the joints with 0. 5 μm thickness of Au, most of AuSn4 IMCs stayed at the inteornce and were in needle-like or dendritic morphology. With the increase of aging time, AuSn4 IMCs beeame flat and changed to a continuous layer. In the joints with 4. 0 μm thickness of Au on pads, AuSn, AuSn2, AuSn4 IMCs and Au2Sn phase formed at the interface. As aging time was increased, more Sn rich IMCs formed at the interface, and evolved to AuSn4 IMCs in condition of long time aging. Thickness of AuSn4 IMCs reached about 30μm.

Effect of Lanthanum on Driving Force for Cu_6Sn_5 Growth and Improvement of Solder Joint Reliability

By means of adding low content of rare earth element La into Sn60 Pb40 solder alloy, the growth of Cu 6Sn 5 intermetallic compound at the interface of solder joint is hindered, and the thermal fatigue life of solder joint is increased by 2 times. The results of thermodynamic calculation based on diffusion kinetics show that, the driving force for Cu 6Sn 5 growth is lowered by adding small content of La in Sn60 Pb40 solder alloy. Meanwhile, there is an effective local mole fraction range of La, in which, 0 18% is the limited value and 0 08% is the best value.

Influence of Thermal Cycling on the Microstructure and Shear Strength of Sn3.5Ag0.75Cu and Sn63Pb37 Solder Joints on Au/Ni Metallization

The influence of thermal cycling on the microstructure and joint strength of Sn3.5Ag0.75Cu （SAC） and Sn63Pb37 （SnPb） solder joints was investigated. SAC and SnPb solder balls were soldered on 0.1 and 0.9 μm Au finished metallization, respectively. After 1000 thermal cycles between -40℃ and 125℃, a very thin intermetallic compound （IMC） layer containing Au, Sn, Ni, and Cu formed at the interface between SAC solder joints and underneath metallization with 0.1 μm Au finish, and （Au, Ni, Cu）Sn4 and a very thin AuSn-Ni-Cu IMC layer formed between SAC solder joints and underneath metallization with 0.9 μm Au finish. For SnPb solder joints with 0.1 μm Au finish, a thin （Ni, Cu, Au）3Sn4 IMC layer and a Pb-rich layer formed below and above the （Au, Ni）Sn4 IMC, respectively. Cu diffused through Ni layer and was involved into the IMC formation process. Similar interfacial microstructure was also found for SnPb solder joints with 0.9μm Au finish. The results of shear test show that the shear strength of SAC solder joints is consistently higher than that of SnPb eutectic solder joints during thermal cycling.

Plastic characterization and performance of SnAgCuBiNi/Cu lead-free BGA solder joints

Nanoindentation test is performed on study the plastic and creep properties of the Sn-Ag-Cu （SAC） lead-free ball grid array （ BGA ） solder joints. The dynamic hardness of two kinds of solder joints decreases with indentation depth increase. SACO705 BiNi/ Cu exhibits a higher ultimate dynamic hardness and a smaller indentation depth than SAC305/ Cu. Then the strain hardening phenomenon of SAC305/ Cu is more obvious compared to that of SACO705 BiNi/ Cu. The indentation creep of SACO705BiNi/ Cu solder joint is lower than that of SAC305/ Cu solder joint before and after thermal shock. The creep rate sensitive index of SACBiNi/Cu solder joint is lower than that of solder joint. SACO705BiNi/Cu solder joint is superior to SAC305/Cu solder joint in the anti-creep property. The plasticity of SACOTOSBiNi/Cu and SAC305/Cu solder joints are similar. Compared with SAC305 solder, the SACO705 BiNi solder pe^forms higher hardness and solder creep resistance and still maintains a good plasticity.

The Numerical Analysis of Strain Behavior at Solder Joint and Interface of Flip Chip Package

The flip chip package is a kind of advanced electri ca l packages. Due to the requirement of miniaturization, lower weight, higher dens ity and higher performance in the advanced electric package, it is expected that flip chip package will soon be a mainstream technology. The silicon chip is dir ectly connected to printing circuit substrate by SnPb solder joints. Also, the u nderfill, a composite of polymer and silica particles, is filled in the gap betw een the chip and substrate around the solder joints to improve the reliabili ty of solder joints. When flip chip package specimen is tested with thermal cycl ing, the cyclic stress/strain response that exists at the underfill interfaces and solder joints may result in interfacial crack initiation and propagation. Therefore, the chip cracking and the interfacial delamination between underfill and chip corner have been investigated in many studies. Also, most researches h ave focused on the effect of fatigue and creep properties of solder joint induce d by the plastic strain alternation and accumulation. The nuderfill must have lo w viscosity in the liquid state and good adhesion to the interface after solidif ying. Also, the mechanical behavior of such epoxy material has much dependen ce on temperature in its glass transition temperature range that is usually cove red by the temperature range of thermal cycling test. Therefore, the materia l behavior of underfill exists a significant non-linearity and the assumption o f linear elastic can lack for accuracy in numerical analysis. Through numerical analysis, this study had some comparisons about the effect of linear and non -linear properties of underfill on strain behaviors around the interface of fli p chip assembly. Especially, the deformation tendency inside solder bumps could be predicted. Also, it is worthily mentioned that we have pointed out which comp onent of plastic strain, thus, either normal or shear, has dominant influence to the fatigue and creep of solder bump, which have not brought up before. About the numerical analysis to the thermal plastic strain occurs in flip chip i nterconnection during thermal cycling test, a commercial finite element software , namely, ANSYS, was employed to simulate the thermal cycling test obeyed by MIL-STD-883C. The temperatures of thermal cycling ranged from -55 ℃ to 125 ℃ with ramp rate of 36 ℃/min and a dwell time of 25 min at peak temperature. T he schematic drawing of diagonal cross-section of flip chip package composed of FR-4 substrate, silicon chip, underfill and solder bump was shown as Fig.1. Th e numerical model was two-dimensional (2-D) with plane strain assumption and o nly one half of the cross-section was modeled due to geometry symmetry. The dim ensions and boundary conditions of numerical model were shown in Fig.2. The symm etric boundary conditions were applied along the left edge of the model, and the left bottom corner was additional constrained in vertical direction to prevent body motion. The finite element meshes of overall and local numerical model was shown as Fig.3. In this study, two cases of material model were used to describe the material behavior of the underfill: the case1 was linear elastic model that assumed Young’s Modulus (E) and thermal expansion coefficient (CTE) were consta nt during thermal cycling; the case2 was MKIN model (in ANSYS) that had nonlinea r temperature-dependent stress-strain relationship and temperature-dependent CTE. The material model applied to the solder bump was ANAND model (in ANSYS) th at described time-dependent plasticity phenomenon of viscoplastic material. Bot h the FR-4 substrate and silicon chip were assumed as temperature-independent elastic material; moreover, FR-4 substrate is orthotropic while silicon chip is isotropic. From the comparison between numerical results of linear and nonlinear material a ssumption of underfill, (i.e. case1 and case2), the quantities of plastic strain around the interconnection from case1 are higher than that in case2. Thus, the linear

Mechanical strength analysis of SMT solder joints by finite element method

In this paper,the finite element calculation is applied to the analysis of stress inside the SMT solder joints.The effects of the solder joints'shape,the voids inside them and the quantity of solder on the mechanical strength of the SMT solder joints are analyzed and compared This is essential to the design of the SMT solder joints and soldering techniques.

Effects of bismuth on growth of intermetallic compounds in Sn-Ag-Cu Pb-free solder joints

The effects of Bi addition on the growth of intermetallic compound (IMC) formation in Sn-3.8Ag-0.7Cu solder joints were investigated. The test samples were prepared by conventional surface mounting technology. To investigate the element diffusion and the growth kinetics of intermetallics formation in solder joint, isothermal aging test was performed at temperatures of 100, 150, and 190℃, respectively. The optical microscope (OM) and scanning electron microscope (SEM) were used to observe microstructure evolution of solder joint and to estimate the thickness and the grain size of the intermetallic layers. The IMC phases were identified by energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) and X-ray diffractometer (XRD). The results clearly show that adding about 1.0% Bi in Sn-Ag-Cu solder alloy system can refine the grain size of the IMC and inhibit the excessive IMC growth in solder joints, and therefore improve the reliability of the Pb-free solder joints. Through observation of the microstructural evolution of the solder joints, the mechanism of inhibition of IMC growth due to Bi addition was proposed.

Interfacial intermetallic compound growth and shear strength of low-silver SnAgCuBiNi/Cu lead-free solder joints

The growth rule of the interfacial intermetallic compound （IMC） and the degradation of shear strength of Sn-0.SAg-0.5Cu-2.0Bi-0.05Ni （SACBN）/Cu solder joints were investigated in comparison with Sn-3.0Ag-0.5Cu （SAC305）/ Cu solder joints aging at 373, 403, and 438 K. The results show that （Cul-x,Nix）6Sn5 phase forms between the SACBN solder and Cu substrate during soldering. The interracial IMC thickens constantly with the aging time increasing, and the higher the aging temperature, the faster the IMC layer grows. Compared with the SAC305/Cu couple, the SACBN/Cu couple exhibits a lower layer growth coefficient. The activation energies of IMC growth for SACBN/Cu and SAC305/Cu couples are 111.70 and 82.35 kJ/mol, respectively. In general, the shear strength of aged solder joints declines continuously. However, SACBN/Cu solder joints exhibit a better shear strength than SAC305/Cu solder joints.

Influence of Bi Addition on Pure Sn Solder Joints: Interfacial Reaction, Growth Behavior and Thermal Behavior

The effects of different Bi contents on the properties of Sn solders were studied. The interfacial reaction and growth behavior of intermetallic compounds (IMCs) layer(7/-Cu6Sn5 + e-Cu3Sn) for various soldering time and the influence of Bi addition on the thermal behavior of Sn-xBi solder alloys were investigated. The Cu6Sn5 IMC could be observed as long as the molten solder contacted with the Cu substrate. However, with the longer welding time such as 60 and 300 s, the Cu3Sn IMC was formed at the interface between Cu6Sn5 and Cu substrate. With the increase of soldering time, the thickness of total IMCs increased, meanwhile, the grain size of Cu6Sn5 also increased. An appropriate amount of Bi element was beneficial for the growth of total IMCs, but excessive Bi (≥ 5 wt%) inhibited the growth of Cu6Sn5 and Cu3Sn IMC in Sn-xBi/ Cu microelectronic interconnects. Furthermore, with the Bi contents increasing (Sn-l0Bi solder in this present investigation), some Bi particles accumulated at the interface between Cu6Sn5 layer and the solder.

Solder joint geometry of tin-lead alloy and its application in electronic packaging

By employing the minimum energy theorem, the Potential energy controlling equation, which consists of surface energy and gravitational energy for molten meniscus, was investigated. The soder joint geometry of molten tin-lead soder alloy for chip component and thin quad flat package were simulated with finite element method. The simulation results 0f solder joint geometry are coincident well with the experimental results. The solder joint geometry was applied to study the solder joint reliability for chip component RC3216.The thermal cycling tests revealed that the solder joint geometry plays an important ro1e in solder joint reliability.

Thermo-mechanical fatigue reliability optimization of PBGA solder joints based on ANN-PSO

Based on a method combined artificial neural network (ANN) with particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm, the thermo-mechanical fatigue reliability of plastic ball grid array (PBGA) solder joints was studied. The simulation experiments of accelerated thermal cycling test were performed by ANSYS software. Based on orthogonal array experiments, a back-propagation artificial neural network (BPNN) was used to establish the nonlinear multivariate relationship between thermo-mechanical fatigue reliability and control factors. Then, PSO was applied to obtaining the optimal levels of control factors by using the output of BPNN as the affinity measure. The results show that the control factors, such as print circuit board (PCB) size, PCB thickness, substrate size, substrate thickness, PCB coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE), substrate CTE, silicon die CTE, and solder joint CTE, have a great influence on thermo-mechanical fatigue reliability of PBGA solder joints. The ratio of signal to noise of ANN-PSO method is 51.77 dB and its error is 33.3% less than that of Taguchi method. Moreover, the running time of ANN-PSO method is only 2% of that of the BPNN. These conclusions are verified by the confirmative experiments.

Hillock Sn whiskers growth behaviors in Sn0.3Ag0.7Cu/Cu solder joints during corrosion

Hillock Sn whiskers in Sn0.3Ag0.7Cu solder are investigated in 20 seconds in corrosive climate(95% methanol and 5% nitric acid),and the growth mechanism of hillock Sn whiskers is studied.The results indicate that hillock Sn whiskers are formed near the interface of Sn0.3Ag0.7Cu/Cu solder joints,and small corrosion pits provide conceive sites for Sn whiskers. Moreover,compressive stress induced by IMC reaction and oxidation for the whisker growth may be suggested as the driving force.