Aerosol Jet Printing SIR Patterns on Real World Components
In this study, aerosol jet printing, an additive manufacturing technology for electronics, was used to manufacture surface insulation resistance (SIR) test structures that were tested in the ability to detect cleanliness defects and provide stable results when none are present, as well as their survivability to standard electronics wash processes.
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Authored By:
Jaime E. Regis, Ph.D., Daniel Hartley
Honeywell FM&T
MS, USA
Summary
Cleanliness validation of printed circuit assemblies has become more and more important as electronics progress to becoming smaller, denser, and more difficult to clean, prompting an increase in reliance in custom solutions. With increasingly fast paced development cycles, long lead times and costs of quality custom surrogate test boards become prohibitive in obtaining cleanliness data that is a true representative of the final product.
In this study, aerosol jet printing, an additive manufacturing technology for electronics, was used to manufacture surface insulation resistance (SIR) test structures that were tested in the ability to detect cleanliness defects and provide stable results when none are present, as well as their survivability to standard electronics wash processes. Additionally, SIR test structures were printed directly onto ball-grid-arrays (BGAs) and tested the survivability of conformally printed leads for data acquisition. SIR test structures displayed good wash survivability on standard FR4 and BGAs, including wraparounds for on-component prints, and high sensitivity to cleanliness defects. The presented results demonstrate the feasibility of printed SIR structures as a quick-turn, highly customizable solution with potential for high fidelity cleanliness testing.
Conclusions
Printed electronics, or additive manufacturing of electronics, enables enhanced capabilities not available through traditional electronics manufacturing processes and offers a quick turn, custom solution to the manufacturing challenges of surface insulation resistance testing. Aerosol jet printing, a contactless deposition method, has been demonstrated to be a reliable method for fabricating custom SIR test structures that cannot only survive the harsh wash processes electronic boards go through, but also perform up to par with standard SIR sensors by providing high stability when clean and high sensitivity to common processing soils. Furthermore, by employing this technology onto components, these SIR test structures present opportunities for more readily available evaluations alongside current wash validation test methods.
Initially Published in the SMTA Proceedings
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