Investigating Mechanical Force During Pick and Place Towards Crack Package Performance in Small Outline Packages

The demand for the smallest package size with relatively good performance and energy efficiency has significantly increased. One interesting package is known as the Small Outline Packages (SOP), which is widely used as a surface-mounted for automotive and non-automotive applications. It is also commonly used as a rectifier and switch to be integrated into a complete circuit. Although it is known to work well, crack packages may occur, leading to reliability failure for the end user. The issue of crack packages is critical, which represents a significant challenge in semiconductor manufacturing, especially at the pick and place process where the movement of the unit cannot be seen clearly by the naked eye due to its fast movement speed.This paper focuses on the crack package analysis, which has the potential to occur during unit placement of the smaller package outline that run pick and place process due to the package strength and mechanical force. In this study, the package strength was measured, and study of mechanical strength was done to release the package with zero potential for crack at the pick and place process. The package strength was identified using a 3-point bent test, where the package will break when reaching a certain threshold force during the package initialization. The finding highlighted that the external force that exceeded the package strength would generate a crack line. In handling the crack issue, three mechanisms can be applied. Firstly, reduce the force exerted on the picker by controlling the insertion force in the servo motor parameter. Secondly, optimize the opener of adjuster by studying on the motor parameter. Finally, earlier detection in the pick and place process for assurance of zero escape of any potential crack is essential. This can be done by increasing the sensitivity of detection by optimizing the arm-down overload detection value. The unit will be automatically sorted into the reject bin if the value is above the allowable detection value.