Electronic packaging
Encyclopedia
Electronic packaging is a major discipline within the field of electronic engineering, and includes a wide variety of technologies. It refers to enclosures and protective features built into the product itself, and not to shipping container
s. It applies both to end products and to components.
sealed housings. Quantities tend to be small; sometimes only one unit of a custom design is required. Piece part costs are high, but there is little or no cost for custom tooling, and first-piece deliveries can take as little as half a day. The tool of choice is a numerically controlled vertical milling machine, with automatic translation of computer-aided design (CAD) files to toolpath command files.
", potting consists of immersing the part or assembly in a liquid resin, and then curing it. Potting can be done in a pre-molded potting shell, or directly in a mold. Today it is most widely used to protect semiconductor components from moisture and mechanical damage, and to serve as a mechanical structure holding the lead frame and the chip together. In earlier times it was often used to discourage reverse engineering of proprietary products built as printed circuit modules. It is also commonly used in high voltage products to allow live parts to be placed much closer together, so that the product can be smaller; also, to keep dirt and conductive contaminants such as impure water out of sensitive areas. Another use is to protect deep-submergence items such as sonar transducers from collapsing under extreme pressure, by filling all voids. Potting can be rigid or soft. When void-free potting is required, it's common practice to place the product in a vacuum chamber while the resin is still liquid, hold a vacuum for several minutes to draw the air out of internal cavities and the resin itself, then release the vacuum. Atmospheric pressure collapses the voids and forces the liquid resin into all internal spaces. Vacuum potting works best with resins that cure by polymerization, rather than solvent evaporation.
, Parylene
.
). It consists of a drop of specially formulated resin deposited over a semiconductor chip and its wire bonds, to provide mechanical support and exclude contaminants such as fingerprint residues which could disrupt circuit operation.
and HTCC
) and pressed ceramic packages.
Shipping container
A shipping container is a container with strength suitable to withstand shipment, storage, and handling. Shipping containers range from large reusable steel boxes used for intermodal shipments to the ubiquitous corrugated boxes...
s. It applies both to end products and to components.
Sheet metal
Punched and formed sheet metal is one of the oldest types of electronic packaging. It can be mechanically strong, provides electromagnetic shielding when the product requires that feature, and is easily made for prototypes and small production runs with little custom tooling expense. Fairly professional results are possible in a home workshop.Cast metal
Gasketed metal castings are sometimes used to package electronic equipment for exceptionally severe environments, such as in heavy industry, aboard ship, or deep under water. Aluminum die castings are more common than iron or steel sand castings.Machined metal
Electronic packages are sometimes made by machining solid blocks of metal, usually aluminum, into complex shapes. They are fairly common in microwave assemblies for aerospace use, where precision transmission lines require complex metal shapes, in combination with hermeticallyHermetic seal
A hermetic seal is the quality of being airtight. In common usage, the term often implies being impervious to air or gas. When used technically, it is stated in conjunction with a specific test method and conditions of usage.-Etymology :...
sealed housings. Quantities tend to be small; sometimes only one unit of a custom design is required. Piece part costs are high, but there is little or no cost for custom tooling, and first-piece deliveries can take as little as half a day. The tool of choice is a numerically controlled vertical milling machine, with automatic translation of computer-aided design (CAD) files to toolpath command files.
Molded plastic
Molded plastic cases and structural parts can be made by a variety of methods, offering tradeoffs in piece part cost, tooling cost, mechanical and electrical properties, and ease of assembly. Examples are injection molding, transfer molding, vacuum forming, and die cutting. Pl can be post-processed to provide conductive surfaces when confused.Potting
Formally called "encapsulationEncapsulation
- Chemistry :* Molecular encapsulation, in chemistry, the confinement of an individual molecule within a larger molecule* Capsule , in pharmacy, the enclosure of a medicine within a relatively stable shell for administration...
", potting consists of immersing the part or assembly in a liquid resin, and then curing it. Potting can be done in a pre-molded potting shell, or directly in a mold. Today it is most widely used to protect semiconductor components from moisture and mechanical damage, and to serve as a mechanical structure holding the lead frame and the chip together. In earlier times it was often used to discourage reverse engineering of proprietary products built as printed circuit modules. It is also commonly used in high voltage products to allow live parts to be placed much closer together, so that the product can be smaller; also, to keep dirt and conductive contaminants such as impure water out of sensitive areas. Another use is to protect deep-submergence items such as sonar transducers from collapsing under extreme pressure, by filling all voids. Potting can be rigid or soft. When void-free potting is required, it's common practice to place the product in a vacuum chamber while the resin is still liquid, hold a vacuum for several minutes to draw the air out of internal cavities and the resin itself, then release the vacuum. Atmospheric pressure collapses the voids and forces the liquid resin into all internal spaces. Vacuum potting works best with resins that cure by polymerization, rather than solvent evaporation.
Porosity Sealing or Impregnation
Porosity Sealing or Resin Impregnation is similar to potting, but doesn't use a shell or a mold. Parts are submerged in a polymerizable monomer or solvent-based low viscosity plastic solution. The pressure above the fluid is lowered to a full vacuum. After the vacuum is released, the fluid flows into the part. When the part is withdrawn from the resin bath, it is drained and/or cleaned and then cured. Curing can consist of polymerizing the internal resin or evaporating the solvent, which leaves an insulating dielectric material between different voltage components. Porosity sealing (Resin Impregnation) fills all interior spaces, and may or may not leave a thin coating on the surface, depending on the wash/rinse performance. The main application of vacuum impregnation porosity sealing is in boosting the dielectric strength of transformers, solenoids, lamination stacks or coils, and some high voltage components. It prevents ionization from forming between closely spaced live surfaces and initiating failure.Liquid filling
Liquid filling is sometimes used as an alternative to potting or impregnation. It's usually a dielectric fluid, chosen for chemical compatibility with the other materials present. This method is used mostly in very large electrical equipment such as utility transformers, to increase voltage breakdown. It can also be used to improve heat transfer, especially if allowed to circulate by natural convection or forced convection through a heat exchanger. Liquid filling can be removed for repair much more easily than potting.Conformal coating
Conformal coating is a thin insulating coating applied by various methods. It provides mechanical and chemical protection of delicate components. It's widely used on mass-produced items such as axial-lead resistors, and sometimes on printed circuit boards. It can be very economical, but somewhat difficult to achieve consistent process quality. See Conformal coatingConformal coating
Conformal coating material is applied to electronic circuitry to act as protection against moisture, dust, chemicals, and temperature extremes that, if uncoated , could result in damage or failure of the electronics to function...
, Parylene
Parylene
Parylene is the tradename for a variety of chemical vapor deposited poly polymers used as moisture and dielectric barriers. Among them, Parylene C is the most popular due to its combination of barrier properties, cost, and other processing advantages.Parylene is green polymer chemistry...
.
Glob-top
Glob-top is a variant of conformal coating used in chip-on-board assembly (COBCob
-Places:* Cobb, California* Cobb, California, former name of Pine Grove, Lake County, California* Cobb County, Georgia, United States* Cobb, Georgia, an unincorporated community in Sumter County, Georgia, United States...
). It consists of a drop of specially formulated resin deposited over a semiconductor chip and its wire bonds, to provide mechanical support and exclude contaminants such as fingerprint residues which could disrupt circuit operation.
Hermetic metal/glass cases
Hermetic metal packaging began life in the vacuum tube industry, where a totally leak-proof housing was essential to operation. This industry developed the glass-seal electrical feedthrough, using alloys such as Kovar to match the coefficient of expansion of the sealing glass so as to minimize mechanical stress on the critical metal-glass bond as the tube warmed up. Some later tubes used metal cases and feedthroughs, and only the insulation around the individual feedthroughs used glass. Today, glass-seal packages are used mostly in critical components and assemblies for aerospace use, where leakage must be prevented even under extreme changes in temperature, pressure, and humidity.Hermetic ceramic packages
Packages consisting of a lead frame embedded in a vitreous paste layer between flat ceramic top and bottom covers are more convenient than metal/glass packages for some products, but give equivalent performance. Examples are integrated circuit chips in ceramic Dual In-line Package form, or complex hybrid assemblies of chip components on a ceramic base plate. This type of packaging can also be divided into two main types: multilayer ceramic packages (like LTCCLow temperature co-fired ceramic
Low temperature co-fired ceramic devices are monolithic, ceramic microelectronic devices. In this context ‘co-fired ceramic’ means that the ceramic support structure and any conductive, resistive, and dielectric materials are fired in a kiln at the same time, and ‘Low temperature’ means that the...
and HTCC
High temperature co-fired ceramic
High temperature co-fired ceramic is a multi-layer packaging technology for the electronics industry, used in military electronics, MEMS, microprocessor and RF applications....
) and pressed ceramic packages.
Printed circuit assemblies
Printed circuits are primarily a technology for connecting components together, but they also provide mechanical structure. In some products, such as computer accessory boards, they're all the structure there is. This makes them part of the universe of electronic packaging.Design considerations
An engineer or designer must balance many objectives and practical considerations when selecting packaging methods.- Hazards to be protected against: mechanical damage, exposure to weather and dirt, electromagnetic interference, etc.
- Heat dissipation requirements
- Tradeoffs between tooling capital cost and per-unit cost
- Tradeoffs between time to first delivery and production rate
- Availability and capability of suppliers
- User interface design and convenience
- Ease of access to internal parts when required for maintenance
- Product safety, and compliance with regulatory standards
- Aesthetics, and other marketing considerations
- Service life and reliability
Reliability evaluation
A typical reliability qualification includes the following types of environmental stresses:- Burn-in
- Temperature cyclingTemperature cyclingTemperature cycling is the process of cycling through two temperature extremes, typically at relatively high rates of change. It is an environmental stress test used in evaluating product reliability as well as in manufacturing to catch early-term, latent defects by inducing failure through...
- Thermal shockThermal shockThermal shock is the name given to cracking as a result of rapid temperature change. Glass and ceramic objects are particularly vulnerable to this form of failure, due to their low toughness, low thermal conductivity, and high thermal expansion coefficients...
- SolderabilitySolderabilityThe solderability of a substrate is a measure of the ease with which a soldered joint can be made to that material. Good solderability requires wetting of the substrate by the solder....
- AutoclaveAutoclaveAn autoclave is an instrument used to sterilize equipment and supplies by subjecting them to high pressure saturated steam at 121 °C for around 15–20 minutes depending on the size of the load and the contents. It was invented by Charles Chamberland in 1879, although a precursor known as the...
- Visual inspection
- Hermeticity/moisture resistance