An exPerimental study of effect of solder joint geometry on thermal cycle life in SMT

The geometry of solder joint in SMT is one of the important factors which determine the solder joint reliability. In this study, a type of solder joint specimen has been designed and is subjected to thermal cycling to failure between -55℃ to +125℃ with a 36 ℃/min heating and cooling rate and 10 min temperature holding times. The solder joint geometry is castellated and controlled with different solder fillet shape and stand off height. A statistical analysis of the scattered thermal cycle lives of solder joints by two parameter Weibull’s probability density function has been carried out in this paper. The experimental results show that the more reliable solder.joint geometry has flat or slight convex solder fillet with a stand off height larger than 0.1 mm. The results may be the recommended guideline to design optimal solder joint geometry.