An investigation on function of current type on solder joint degradation in electronic packages

Purpose As in real applications several alternating current (AC) currents may be injected to the electronic devices, this study aims to analyze their effects on the lifetime of the solder joints and, consequently, shed the light on these effects at the design phase for other researchers to consider. Design/methodology/approach In this paper, the authors investigated on current waveform shapes on the performance and reliability of the solder joints in electronic package. Three common and extensively used current shapes in several simulations and experiments were selected to study their effects on the solder joint performance. Findings The results demonstrate a sever thermal swing and stress fluctuation in the solder joint induced in the case of triangle current type because the critical states lack any relaxation time. In fact, the stress intensification in the solder under application of the triangle current type has been shown to contribute to increasing brittle intermetallic compounds. An accelerated increase of on-state voltage of power semiconductor was also observed in under application of the triangle current type. Originality/value The originality of this paper is confirmed.