Gen3’s Dr. Chris Hunt to Present at SMTA Electronics in Harsh Environments Conference

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Gen3, a British manufacturer of testing and measuring the electronics industry, announced that Dr Chris Hunt, CTO, will present during the SMTA Electronics in Harsh Environments Conference. The presentation, “Objective Evidence and How to Convince the Auditors,” will take place on Wednesday, May 18, 2022, from 16:30 – 17:00 p.m. at the Park Plaza Victoria Amsterdam.

Gen3’s Dr. Chris Hunt will be addressing the question that everyone is facing in the industry globally, what does ”Objective Evidence “mean/require?

• This will be a measurement system that will be repeatable and reproducible, and that can have a metric that directly relates to performance.
• For ECM a suitable metric is resistance.
• ECM produces corrosion products and ionic current flows that contribute to unwanted circuit elements.
• A measurement of the isolation resistance between circuit features therefore provides a direct circuit performance metric.
• SIR and CAF are examples of techniques that measure resistance, and hence provide Objective Evidence .

SIR, for process validation testing, was first established more than 30 years ago. It was a spin-off from the British CFC Elimination Project led by Dr Colin Lea OBE, at the British National Physical Laboratory. With the then advent of no-clean fluxes, it was the only test method to determine electro-chemical reliability and hence acceptable cleanliness as used at that time.

It was recognised as unsuitable for process control and that process ionic contamination testing (PICT) should be maintained for fast and effective control within 15 minutes.

New test methods have been introduced by IEC in the past 2 years:

• IEC 61189-5-502 – Surface Insulation Resistance (SIR) testing of assemblies - 2021
• IEC 61189-5-504 – Process Ionic Contamination Testing (PICT) - 2020

Gen3’s presentation will also look at the other test methods and compare their pro’s and con’s, including Ion Chromatography, FTIR, SEM + EDAX and new Digital Microscopy.