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FEATURES

• Paste Printing
  Overlooked Features of Stencil Printers
  Some PCB assemblers opt not to use vision inspection and other major stencil printer features, as well as setup process techniques. Yet several problems can occur if a vision inspection isn’t deployed.
  by Alex del Rosario
  

• Cover Story
  Tin Whisker Observations
  Tin whiskers are known to be a hairy problem, with the potential to cause transient or catastrophic electrical short circuits. Here, Raytheon and industry colleagues reveal the observations and SEM images of tin whiskers captured during a series of investigations and experiments aimed at better understanding their growth, evaluating associated reliability risks, and developing mitigation techniques.
  by Robert R. Ogden and Robert F. Champaign
  

• Process Control
  Minimizing Solder Paste Printing Variation
  Research into printing process factors finds the stencil blade angle affects the overall time the paste spends over the aperture, as well as the maximum filling pressure. Both characteristics have a significant effect on the resultant aperture fill.
  by George Babka
  

FIRST PERSON

• Caveat Lector
  A sticky mess.
  Mike Buetow
• Talking Heads
  Tessera’s Craig Mitchell.
  Mike Buetow

MONEY MATTERS

• Focus on Business
  Focused government investment can have a positive impact on business.
  Susan Mucha

TECH TALK

• On the Forefront
  TSV adoption.
  E. Jan Vardaman
• Screen Printing
  Edge clamps and paste transfer.
  Dr. Rita Mohanty
• Selective Soldering
  ‘Dropping’ in on Pb-free alloys.
  Ursula Marquez de Tino and Brian Roggeman
• Wave Soldering Troubleshooting
  Avoiding icicles’ chill.
  Paul Lotosky
• The Defects Database
  PTH corner cracks.
  Dr. Davide Di Maio
• Test and Inspection
  Implementing the 5DX.
  Barbara Koczera
• Process Doctor
  Cleaning creep corrosion.
  Terry Munson
• Tech Tips
  ‘Fixed’ on pallets.
  ACI Technologies Inc.
• Materials World
  Underfill reworkability.
  Jie Bai
• Technical Abstracts
  In case you missed it.

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