Simcenter Micred hardware

An electronic component or IC package consists of various elements, from the chip to the die attach, the base, TIM, the cold plate and the ambient environment. In each of those, there can be imperfections from manufacturing, or degradation and damage can occur during the operational lifetime of the electronics. The imperfections then lead to device failure, leading to warranty costs and a loss of customer goodwill.

Using Simcenter Micred T3STER helps you investigate those imperfections, damage locations and weak spots. Additionally, with Simcenter Micred T3STER, you can identify and visualize the thermal resistance and capacitance steps corresponding to each of the elements in the heat flow path, from junction to ambient. This helps you find the weak spots where you can improve the design, such as by changing the die attach material or thickness. It can also help you identify potential thermal issues, such as thermal path degradation or changes in the
thermal resistance of specific components. Leveraging Simcenter Micred T3STER gives an accurate “fingerprint” of the internal structure and thermal behavior, which is especially insightful when using new designs or materials.

Obtaining accurate values for junction temperature and RthJC, RthJP or RthJA is difficult based on thermal simulation models only. The Simcenter Micred T3STER uses an electrical testing method compliant with the JEDEC 51 standard. Although infrared or thermocouple-based testing methods can be inaccurate or difficult to install and only measure the surface temperature, using Simcenter Micred T3STER is highly accurate within a 1/100th of a degree accuracy while providing full insight into the internal structure and heat flow path from junction to ambient. In addition to accuracy, Simcenter Micred T3STER only requires a single test. With a quick, easy and repeatable setup method, you can speed up your electronics testing processes.

To experimentally verify the predicted lifetime of electronics, manufacturers perform active power cycling tests. Power electronics, experiencing frequent switching and temperature transients in a short period of time, are more prone to failure and reliability issues.

Traditionally, components are tested until failure and then brought into the laboratory to investigate the reason and location of the failure using, for example, visual or x-ray techniques. However, these methods are either destructive or they provide inaccurate and difficult to interpret images. Additionally, you cannot always separate the cause and effect of the failure mechanisms and understand how they interact with each other.

The Simcenter Micred Power Tester hardware and software combine active power cycling with monitoring of thermal and electrical degradation. This process is fully automated, eliminating the need to go back and forth to the laboratory. It clearly separates the damage mechanisms (delamination, tear off, etc.) and pinpoints which interfaces (die attach, solder joints, etc.) are the weak spots that need to be redesigned. It also allows you to design finer and save material costs in certain areas while guaranteeing the expected lifetime of the design.

Once electronics go into mass production, you need to make sure that what is coming off your production line meets requirements. High throughput automatic thermal testing or end-of-line (EoL) testing can help you find production defects before your customers do, and it can guarantee a near-zero percent defect production quality.

Simcenter Micred Quality Tester offers the high flexibility and customization options to fit your needs, whether it is a push-button tester operated by personnel, patch testing automated by a robotic handler, or even EoL testing that is fully automated and integrated to the production line. EoL testing can help you detect assembly errors and alert you to changing production parameters or materials so your team can make go/no-go decisions or sort the produced samples into quality ranges or bins. Given high production rates, EoL testing must be quick, fully automated and integrated with the production line.

The Simcenter Micred Quality Tester hardware and software picks and places every produced item from the production line, applies a short power pulse to verify the junction-to-case thermal resistance and qualifies each sample into a predefined set of quality bins. You can integrate the Simcenter Micred Quality Tester on an existing production line, or it can be useful for NPI when you are defining and optimizing the manufacturing parameters between
the prototype and mass production phase.

Using Simcenter Micred Quality Tester enables packaged power semiconductor manufacturers to elevate their quality assurance practices, advancing from basic quality to consistent quality. The Simcenter Micred Quality Tester software is customizable to support various communication protocols, including SECS/GEM, OPC UA and Modbus.

Thermal simulation models can evaluate a lot of design alternatives quickly without the need for building prototypes, but they are only helpful if the results accurately predict what is happening in the real world. Improving the accuracy of the thermal models based on thermal measurement data boosts the accuracy of your thermal simulation results.

Simcenter includes thermal testing and simulation tools to help you correlate your electronics’ thermal models more easily. Using tools like Simcenter FLOEFD™ software and Simcenter Flotherm™ software provides automatic calibration procedures based on the data measured with Simcenter Micred. With a unique combination of Simcenter tools, you can find the best design of electronic components and packages accurately and efficiently.