Modeling and Experimental Study of a Wire Clamp for Wire Bonding

A wire clamp is used to grip a gold wire with in 1-2 ms during thermosonic wire bonding. Modern wire bonders require faster and larger opening wire clamps. In order to simplify the design process and find the key parameters affecting the opening of wire clamps, a model analysis based on energy conservation was developed. The relation between geometric parameters and the amplification ratio was obtained. A finite element (FE) model was also developed in order to calculate the amplification ratio and natural frequency. Experiments were carried out in order to confirm the results of these models. Model studies show that the arm length was the major factor affecting the opening of the wire clamp.