BY PATRICK McLAUGHLIN
International Electronics Manufacturing Initiative (iNEMI; www.inemi.org) will co-sponsor the third annual Tin Whisker Workshop with the IEEE Components, Packing and Manufacturing Technology Society (CPMT; www.cpmt.org), and the 56th Electronic Components and Technology Conference (ECTC; www.ectc.net).
The workshop, scheduled for May 30 at ECTC in San Diego, CA, will provide participants an update on recent activities in both the testing and modeling of tin whiskers. In addition, a roundtable discussion will focus on implementation of the JEDEC/IPC specifications relating to tin whiskers.
The workshop’s goal is to help the industry identify strategies to help assure that long lifecycle applications will not be subject to tin-whisker failures.
“As the commercial market moves toward environmentally friendly products free of lead, it becomes more important than ever for the industry to understand the tin whisker phenomenon,” says Torsten Wipiejewski, ECTC program chair. “ECTC is proud to once again host this timely and informative workshop.”
Ron Gedney, iNEMI consultant, chairs the workshop. Maureen Williams, mechanical engineer for NIST, is co-chair. Dr. Henning Leidecker, chief engineer of the parts, packing, and assembly technologies office of NASA, will serve as moderator.
“These workshops have proven valuable for bringing industry, government, and academia together to share knowledge about, and expand our understanding of, tin whiskers,” says Carol Handwerker, professor of materials engineering at Purdue University, and former chief of the metallurgy division at NIST and moderator of the first Tin Whisker Workshop.
“The first workshop focused the efforts of the electronics community by clarifying our understanding of when and how whiskers grow,” Handwerker explains. “The second workshop assessed state-of-the-art analytical techniques, such as focused ion beam, electron backscatter diffraction, and wafer curvature, that could be used to separate the complex effects of stress, composition, and structure on whisker formation. This workshop will discuss the risks that remain, based on our current understanding of how whiskers form, and how recent standards specifications are being implemented.”
