Online Condition Monitoring Methodology for Power Electronics Package Reliability Assessment

• Published in: IEEE transactions on power electronics Vol. 39; no. 4; pp. 4725 - 4734
• Main Authors: Martin, Henry A., Smits, Edsger C. P., Poelma, Rene H., van Driel, Willem D., Zhang, GuoQi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01-04-2024; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Acoustic imaging; Application-driven reliability qualification; Condition monitoring; Electrical resistance measurement; Electronic packaging thermal management; Failure mechanisms; Heat pulses; Methodology; Performance degradation; Pulse duration; Reliability analysis; Resistance; Semiconductor device measurement; silver sintering; Temperature dependence; Temperature measurement; Temperature sensors; Thermal cycling; thermal test chips (TTCs); Transient analysis; transient thermal impedance
• ISSN: 0885-8993; 1941-0107
• DOI: 10.1109/TPEL.2024.3352747

This article introduces an online condition monitoring strategy that utilizes a transient heat pulse to detect package thermal performance degradation. The metric employed is the temperature-dependent transient thermal impedance "<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">{{Z}}_{\text {{th}}}{(t,{T}_\text {amb})}</tex-math></inline-formula>." The proposed methodology offers quantitative insights into package thermal performance degradation and effectively pinpoints the presence of multiple failure mechanisms. A thermal test chip assembled in a power quad flat no-lead package is used in this study to demonstrate the methodology. The packaged devices are first characterized to determine the transient pulse duration, a critical parameter to monitor a specific region of interest. Subsequently, package thermal performance degradation is continuously monitored online during thermomechanical cycling lifetime experiments. The validity of the measurement results is later confirmed through acoustic imaging and cross-sectional analysis. The changes observed in <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">{Z}_{\text {th}} (t,{T}_\text {amb}</tex-math></inline-formula>) over thermal cycling correspond to the delamination of the active metal layers on the die and cohesive failure on the die attach. This article further includes a comparative summary, highlighting the distinctions between the proposed and industry-standard test methods. In conclusion, the importance of online condition monitoring to detect early signs of failure is emphasized, and the proposed methodology's practical applicability in real-life scenarios is briefly discussed.