• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.11 no.3 s.32
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• pp.37-45
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• 2004

Electroless Ni(P) has been widely used for under bump metallization (UBM) of flip chip and surface finish layer in microelectronic packaging because of its excellent solderability, corrosion resistance, uniformity, selective deposition without photo-lithography, and also good diffusion barrier. However, the brittle fracture at solder joints and the spatting of intermetallic compound (IMC) associated with electroless Ni(P) are critical issues for its successful applications. In the present study, the mechanism of IMC spatting and microstructure change of the Ni(P) film were investigated with varying P content in the Ni(P) film (4.6,9, and $13 wt.\%$P). A reaction between Sn penetrated through the channels among $Ni_3Sn_4$ IMCs and the P-rich layer ($Ni_3P$) of the Ni(P) film formed a $Ni_3SnP$ layer. Thickening of the $Ni_3SnP$ layer led to $Ni_3Sn_4$ spatting. After $Ni_3Sn_4$ spatting, the Ni(P) film directly contacted the molten solder and the $Ni_3P$ phase further transformed into a $Ni_2P$ phase. During the crystallization process, some cracks formed in the Ni(P) film to release tensile stress accumulated from volume shrinkage of the film.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.45-51
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• 2013

Thermal annealing tests were performed in an in-situ scanning electron microscope chamber at $130^{\circ}C$, $150^{\circ}C$, and $170^{\circ}C$ in order to investigate the effects of solder structure on the growth kinetics of intermetallic compound (IMC) in Cu/Sn-3.5Ag microbump. Cu/Sn-3.5Ag($6{\mu}m$) microbump with spreading solder structure showed $Cu_6Sn_5$ and $Cu_3Sn$ phase growths and then IMC phase transition stages with increasing annealing time. By the way, Cu/Sn-3.5Ag($4{\mu}m$) microbump without solder spreading, remaining solder was transformed to $Cu_6Sn_5$ right after bonding and had only a phase transition of $Cu_6Sn_5$ to $Cu_3Sn$ during annealing. Measured activation energies for the growth of the $Cu_3Sn$ phase during the annealing were 0.80 and 0.71eV for Cu/Sn-3.5Ag($6{\mu}m$) and Cu/Sn-3.5Ag($4{\mu}m$), respectively.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Technology Engineers
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.187-192
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• 2011

UBM(Under Bump Metallurgy) is very important for successful realization of Flip-Chip technology. In this study, it is investigated the interfacial reactions between various Sn-Ag solder alloys and Ni-P/Au UBM and Cu plate finish. It is also evaluated the shear strength by using the micro shear-punch test method for Sn-37Pb alloy, binary and ternary alloys of environment-friendly Pb-free solder alloys which are applied in the electronic packages. In terms of interfacial microstructure, the Pb-free solder joints have thicker IMCs than the Sn-Pb solder joints. The thickness of IMC is related to Reflow time. The IMC has been observed to grow with the increase in Reflow time. As a result of the shear test, in case of Max. shear strength, Pb-free solder showed the highest strength value and Sn-37Pb showed the lowest strength value 10 be generally condition of Reflow time.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2003.05a
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• pp.193-195
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• 2003

Micro-structure and shear properties with reflow conditions, reflow temperature and time, for In-48Sn solder on BGA package were examined at the temperature between 140 and 170$^{\circ}C$ for 10 to 3600sec. With increasing reflow temperature and time, the thickness of intermetallic compound formed between solder and pad increased. Shear test indicated shear force increased in the range to a critical value of reflow time, and decreased over a critical reflow time. With increasing reflow temperature and time, the crater occurred on fracture surface because of a increase of crater by voids and IMC particles precipitated in solder.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.65-69
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• 2012

Environmental and health concerns over the lead have led to investigation of the alternative Pb-free solders to replace commonly used Pb-Sn solders in microelectronic packaging application. The leading candidates for lead-free solder alloys are presently the near eutectic Sn-Ag-Cu alloys. Therefore, extensive studies on reliability related with the composition have been reported. However, the insufficient drop property of the near eutectic Sn-Ag-Cu alloys has demanded solder compositions of low Ag content. In addition, the solder interconnections in automobile applications like a smart box require significantly improved vibration resistance. Therefore, this study investigated the effect of alloying elements (Ag, Bi, In) on the vibration fatigue strength. The vibration fatigue was conducted in 10~1000Hz frequency and 20Grms. The interface of the as-soldered cross section close to the Cu pad indicated the intermetallic compound ($Cu_6Sn_5$) regardless of solder composition. The type and thickness of IMC was not significantly changed after the vibration test. It indicates that no thermal activities occurred significantly during vibration. Furthermore, as a function of alloying composition, the vibration crack path was investigated with a focus on the IMCs. Vibration crack was initiated from the fillet surface of the heel for QFP parts and from the plating layer of chip parts. Regardless of the solder composition, the crack during a vibration test was propagated as same as that during a thermal fatigue test.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.29-34
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• 2020

The behavior of brittle fracture of electroless nickel immersion gold (ENIG) /Sn-3.0wt.%Ag-0.5wt.%Cu (SAC305) solder joints was evaluated. The pH of the electroless nickel plating solution for ENIG surface treatment was changed from 4.0 to 5.5. As the pH of the Ni plating solution increased, pin hole in the Ni-P layer increased. The thickness of the interfacial intermetallic compound (IMC) of the solder joint increased with pH of Ni plating solution. The high speed shear strength of the SAC305 solder joint on ENIG surface finish decreased with the pH of the Ni plating solution. In addition, the brittle fracture rate of the solder joint was the highest when the pH of the Ni plating solution was 5.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.65-70
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• 2019

As a demand of higher power photovoltaic modules, shingled, multi-busbar, half-cell, and bifacial techniques are developed. Multi-busbar module has advantage for large amount of light havesting. And, half-cell is high power module for reducing resistive losses and higher shade tolerance. Recently, researches on multi-busbar is focused on reliability according to adhesion and intermetallic compound between Sn-Pb solder and Ag electrode. And half-cell module is researched to comparing with full-sized cell module for structure difference. In this study, we investigated the factors affecting to efficiency and adhesion of multi-wires half-cell module according to wire thickness, solder thickness, and flux. The results of solar simulator and peel test was that peel strength and efficiency of soldered cell is not related. But samples with flux including high solid material showed high efficiency. The results of FE-SEM and EDX line scan on cross-section between wire and Ag electrode for different flux showed thickness of solder joint between wire and Ag electrode is increasing through solid material increasing. Flux including high solid material would affect to solder behavior on Ag electrode. Higher solid material occurred lower growth of IMC layer because solder permeate to sider of wire ribbon than Ag electrode. And it increased fill factor for high efficiency. In soldering process, amount of solid material in flux and solder thickness are the factor related with characteristic of soldered photovoltaic cell.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.97-103
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• 2014

Among various lead-free solders, the Sn-58Bi solders have been considered as a highly promising lead-free solders because of its low melting temperature and high tensile strength. However, Sn-58Bi solder has the poor ductility. To enhance the mechanical property of Sn-58Bi solder, epoxy-enhanced Sn-58Bi solders have been studied. This study compared the microstructures and the mechanical properties of Sn-58Bi solder and Sn-58Bi epoxy solder with aging treatment. The solders ball were formed on the printed circuit board (PCB) with organic solderability preservative (OSP) surface finish, and then the joints were aged at 85, 95, 105 and $115^{\circ}C$ for up to 100, 300, 500 and 1000 hours. The shear test was conducted to evaluate the mechanical property of the solder joints. $Cu_6Sn_5$ intermetallic compound (IMC) layer grew with increasing aging time and temperature. The IMC layer for the Sn-58Bi epoxy solder was thicker than that for the Sn-58Bi solder. According to result of shear test, the shear strength of Sn-58Bi epoxy solder was higher than that of Sn-58Bi solder and the shear strength decreased with increasing aging time.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.45-50
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• 2017

We investigated effect of Zn content on shear strengh of Sn-0.7Cu-xZn and OSP surface finished solder joints. Five pastes of Sn-0.7Cu-xZn (x=0, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 wt.%) solders were fabricated by mixing of solder powder and flux using planatary mixer. $180{\mu}m$ diameter solder balls were formed on OSP surface finished Cu electrodes by screen print method, and the reflow process was performed. The shear strength was evaluated with two high shear speeds; 0.01 and 0.1 m/s. The thickness of the intermetallic compound(IMC) layer was decreased with increasing Zn content in Sn-0.7Cu-xZn solder. The highest shear strength was 3.47 N at the Zn content of 0.5 wt.%. As a whole, the shear strength at condition of 0.1 m/s was higher than that of 0.01 m/s because of impact stress. Fracture energies were calculated by F-x (Force-displacement) curve during high speed shear test and the tendency of fracture energy and that of shear strength were good agreement each other. Fracture took place within solder matrix at lower Zn content, and fracture occured near the interface of OSP surface finished Cu electrode and solder at higher Zn content.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.61-67
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• 2005

Since lead (Pb)-free solders for electronics have higher melting points than that of eutectic Sn-Pb solder, they need higher soldering temperatures. In order to decrease the soldering temperature we tried to coat Sn-Bi layer on $Sn-3.5\%Ag$ solder by electroplating, which applies the mechanism of transient liquid phase bonding to soldering. During heating Bi will diffuse into the $Sn-3.5\%Ag$ solder and this results in decreasing soldering temperature. As bonding samples, the 1608 capacitor electroplated with Sn, and PCB, its surface was finished with electroless-plated Ni/Au, were selected. The $Sn-95.7\%Bi$ coated Sn-3.5Ag was supplied as a solder between the capacitor and PCB land. The samples were reflowed at $220^{\circ}C$, which was lower than that of normal reflow temperature, $240\~250^{\circ}C$, for the Pb-free. As experimental result, the joint of $Sn-95.7\%Bi$ coated Sn-3.5Ag showed high shear strength. In the as-reflowed state, the shear strength of the coated solder showed 58.8N, whereas those of commercial ones were 37.2N (Sn-37Pb), 31.4N (Sn-3Ag-0.5Cu), and 40.2N (Sn-8Zn-3Bi). After thermal shock of 1000 cycles between $-40^{\circ}C$ and $+125^{\circ}C$, shear strength of the coated solder showed 56.8N, whereas the previous commercial solders were in the range of 32.3N and 45.1N. As the microstructures, in the solder $Ag_3Sn$ intermetallic compound (IMC), and along the bonded interface $Ni_3Sn_4$ IMC were observed.