Author Topic: FR-4 TG material  (Read 7866 times)

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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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FR-4 TG material
« on: December 23, 2017, 08:26:01 am »
Hello
I want to order some PCBs.
the PCB manufacturer said me the material is FR-4 standard. (TG130 or TG140)
now my problem is:
how much the maximum temperature can I use during soldering with a hot air (rework station) for such a PCB?
I have some high speed ADC/DAC/Crystal OSC/ 0.8mm connectors/2.54mm male header... on my board.



Thanks
« Last Edit: December 23, 2017, 02:45:19 pm by xzswq21 »
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Offline ebclr

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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #2 on: December 23, 2017, 02:49:41 pm »
http://www.surfacemountprocess.com/-pcb-delamination-during-reflow.html

consider the material is TG140 and thermal profile of a part is as shown:

my board is controlled impedance to have 50 R impedance.
how should I solder the part?
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Offline ebclr

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #3 on: December 23, 2017, 02:59:54 pm »
You need to know details of your solder paste, have many kinds, and this is a key point to decide

Here somebody doing something similar

https://youtu.be/2Z7nCAxS2Rg
 

Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #4 on: December 23, 2017, 03:17:02 pm »
You need to know details of your solder paste, have many kinds, and this is a key point to decide

Here somebody doing something similar


the company uses FR4 (KB6160A TG130).
I'm using the below solder paste:
https://www.amazon.com/XG-Z40-Syringe-Solder-Paste-25-45um/dp/B077G79YRL

plus I have some solder wire as below from ASAHI SOLDER company:
0.3mm 63%SN(Tin), 37%PB(Lead)
0.6mm
0.8mm
« Last Edit: December 23, 2017, 03:44:42 pm by xzswq21 »
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Offline ebclr

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #5 on: December 23, 2017, 03:26:37 pm »
Do you have a stencil, or will be by hand ?
 

Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #6 on: December 23, 2017, 03:43:42 pm »
Do you have a stencil, or will be by hand ?

soldering by my hand   :box:
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Offline ebclr

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #7 on: December 23, 2017, 03:55:13 pm »
Do you have a preheater ?

Case not, you need to start with the hot air fair away +- 300C,  +- 15 cm, and coming near to make a preheat +- 150C near the IC pads, do this until you see the flux poping out of the paste, after that coming down slowly until the solder start to melt.


Another video as reference


 

Offline vzoole

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #8 on: December 26, 2017, 01:14:50 am »
If you have good quality PCB material you don't have to worry about reflow soldering.
e.g. Eurocircuits use Isola IS 400 or Technolam NP-155F board (TG150) that delaminate at 260°C more than 1 hour.
http://www.isola-group.com/wp-content/uploads/data-sheets/is400.pdf
https://www.eurocircuits.com/wp-content/uploads/ec2015/ecImage/document/NP155F-D-5-2012.pdf

In case of china board the base material could be a big question and risk.
 
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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #9 on: December 26, 2017, 10:01:18 pm »
Can I use lead-free soldering wire and lead-free solder paste?
I've heard lead-free version has a lower melting temperature.
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Offline mars01

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #10 on: December 26, 2017, 10:11:11 pm »
Can I use lead-free soldering wire and lead-free solder paste?
I've heard lead-free version has a lower melting temperature.

It's actually the other way around. Lead-Free solder paste and/or solder-wire has a much higher melting point than the leaded one.
It's a pain to rework a PCB that was assembled using lead-free solder.
 
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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #11 on: December 28, 2017, 10:02:02 am »
If you have good quality PCB material you don't have to worry about reflow soldering.
e.g. Eurocircuits use Isola IS 400 or Technolam NP-155F board (TG150) that delaminate at 260°C more than 1 hour.
http://www.isola-group.com/wp-content/uploads/data-sheets/is400.pdf
https://www.eurocircuits.com/wp-content/uploads/ec2015/ecImage/document/NP155F-D-5-2012.pdf

In case of china board the base material could be a big question and risk.

are there any low price manufacturers in USA or Europe?
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Offline mars01

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #12 on: December 28, 2017, 08:49:44 pm »
If you have good quality PCB material you don't have to worry about reflow soldering.
e.g. Eurocircuits use Isola IS 400 or Technolam NP-155F board (TG150) that delaminate at 260°C more than 1 hour.
http://www.isola-group.com/wp-content/uploads/data-sheets/is400.pdf
https://www.eurocircuits.com/wp-content/uploads/ec2015/ecImage/document/NP155F-D-5-2012.pdf

In case of china board the base material could be a big question and risk.

are there any low price manufacturers in USA or Europe?

It depends on how you define "low price" and what are your requirements for the PCB. If your design has blind/buried vias, drills under 0.3mm, impedance control, more than 4 layers and so on, then even in China price per dm2 is going up quite fast.
 

Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #13 on: December 28, 2017, 09:07:34 pm »
are there any low price manufacturers in USA or Europe?

It depends on how you define "low price" and what are your requirements for the PCB. If your design has blind/buried vias, drills under 0.3mm, impedance control, more than 4 layers and so on, then even in China price per dm2 is going up quite fast.

the minimum trace is 8 mil
clearance is 8 mil
4 layers
12/20 mils vias
0.3mm holes
impedance control for the high speed ADC's LVDS Bus
but the board size is 10x10cm
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Offline mars01

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #14 on: December 29, 2017, 10:55:28 pm »
There is a company in Bulgaria who do cheap PCB's (and the price for components is the best I could find in EU: actually the prices for passive are sometimes better than China and from good manufacturers, too). It's called Comet Electronics. http://www.comet.bg/?cid=92

They do not do BGA's so for our need we ended up doing the PCB's for prototypes with EuroCircuits. But EuroCircuits might not fit in your idea of cheap.
« Last Edit: December 30, 2017, 08:30:36 pm by mars01 »
 

Offline asmi

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #15 on: January 07, 2018, 07:48:13 pm »
If you plan to do a reflow (even 2 reflows for double-sided placement of parts) as a primary soldering method (some manual soldering of thru-hole parts are OK), in my experience even cheapest Tg130 FR4 is going to be just fine for lead-free profiles. As long as you don't overheat your board, internal structure (and thus trace impedance) will not be affected much my soldering, but I strongly advise against manual soldering unless it's absolutely necessary (like for thru-hole connectors). And when you do manual soldering, always leave enough time for things to coll down between repeated heating.
But again, unless you absolutely have to use lead-free process, I'd suggest you to stick to leaded one as it's much more forgiving and has lower melting point. Now - there is Bismuth-based low-temperature lead-free paste, but as far as I understand it is not recommended to be used for production - only for prototyping or repair/rework. It's also often used for non-FR-based boards some of which are very sensitive to heating.
 
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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #16 on: January 07, 2018, 10:29:03 pm »
If you plan to do a reflow (even 2 reflows for double-sided placement of parts) as a primary soldering method (some manual soldering of thru-hole parts are OK), in my experience even cheapest Tg130 FR4 is going to be just fine for lead-free profiles. As long as you don't overheat your board, internal structure (and thus trace impedance) will not be affected much my soldering, but I strongly advise against manual soldering unless it's absolutely necessary (like for thru-hole connectors). And when you do manual soldering, always leave enough time for things to coll down between repeated heating.
But again, unless you absolutely have to use lead-free process, I'd suggest you to stick to leaded one as it's much more forgiving and has lower melting point. Now - there is Bismuth-based low-temperature lead-free paste, but as far as I understand it is not recommended to be used for production - only for prototyping or repair/rework. It's also often used for non-FR-based boards some of which are very sensitive to heating.

Dear
what do you mean "manual soldering"? I don't have any "pick up & place" machines.

on my PCB I have 1600 pads! many QFN / LFCSP/ 0402 0603 0805 ... Packages
consider I have 10 pieces of a QFN-7x7 ICs.
is the below instruction right?
1-I should preheat the board to 100~150'C
2- soldering the first IC with an How Air within 250'C.
3-now I should wait to cool down the PCB to 150'C? for other ICs I should do the same?

some tracks are LVDS and impedance controlled.
the material is FR-4 TG140 and the board is 4-Layers.
I don't want to use a lead-free solder paste bcoz the melting point is higher than Sn63Pb37 (standard solder paste)

Thanks
« Last Edit: January 07, 2018, 10:31:13 pm by xzswq21 »
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Offline asmi

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #17 on: January 07, 2018, 11:11:14 pm »
what do you mean "manual soldering"? I don't have any "pick up & place" machines.
Exactly what it sounds like - manual soldering with an iron. I don't have PnP here as well, so I place parts manually and then reflow them in the oven.

on my PCB I have 1600 pads! many QFN / LFCSP/ 0402 0603 0805 ... Packages
consider I have 10 pieces of a QFN-7x7 ICs.
is the below instruction right?
1-I should preheat the board to 100~150'C
2- soldering the first IC with an How Air within 250'C.
3-now I should wait to cool down the PCB to 150'C? for other ICs I should do the same?
My latest 6 layer board had similar amount of components (all kinds of sizes from big FBGA-256 down to tiny 0201 capacitors).
I use stencil to print the solder paste, then I manually place all SMT parts under microscope, after than I put the board in the oven for reflow. There is no way you will get the temperature right with hot air gun - not to mention the heating will be very uneven, so recommend you either buy or build an oven.

Cooling down was mentioned for manual soldering (with an iron). Most boards contain at least some thru-hole parts (usually connectors and such), so you will have to do at least some manual soldering.

some tracks are LVDS and impedance controlled.
the material is FR-4 TG140 and the board is 4-Layers.
I don't want to use a lead-free solder paste bcoz the melting point is higher than Sn63Pb37 (standard solder paste)
That's fine for prototypes, but remember you will need to use lead-free process for production (unless your board is a hobby/non-commercial product).
 
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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #18 on: January 08, 2018, 05:58:33 pm »
My latest 6 layer board had similar amount of components (all kinds of sizes from big FBGA-256 down to tiny 0201 capacitors).
I use stencil to print the solder paste, then I manually place all SMT parts under microscope, after than I put the board in the oven for reflow. There is no way you will get the temperature right with hot air gun - not to mention the heating will be very uneven, so recommend you either buy or build an oven.

Cooling down was mentioned for manual soldering (with an iron). Most boards contain at least some thru-hole parts (usually connectors and such), so you will have to do at least some manual soldering.

I have many components at the both side of the PCB.
could you please explain more about the oven process?
I mean once I should mount the components at the top layer and put into the oven and once again I do the same for the buttom layer?
how much time does it take during a oven process?
Thanks
« Last Edit: January 08, 2018, 06:01:28 pm by xzswq21 »
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Offline mars01

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #19 on: January 08, 2018, 07:01:32 pm »
If you have big/heavy SMD components you'll need to use glue under them such as when you flip the board for reflow on the other side, your components will not fall. If your components are small then you may get away without glue.
 
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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #20 on: January 08, 2018, 07:13:43 pm »
If you have big/heavy SMD components you'll need to use glue under them such as when you flip the board for reflow on the other side, your components will not fall. If your components are small then you may get away without glue.

I have many 0201, 0402, 0603, 0805, 1206, 1210, QFN7x7 (ADC), LFCSP (4x4)... components, Crystal Oscillator...
Actually most of my ICs have ground PAD.
I don't have any special glue... but I know a thermal tape like below:

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Offline asmi

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #21 on: January 08, 2018, 11:39:40 pm »
I have many components at the both side of the PCB.
could you please explain more about the oven process?
I mean once I should mount the components at the top layer and put into the oven and once again I do the same for the buttom layer?
how much time does it take during a oven process?
Thanks
My board has only passives on the bottom side:

So I place bottom side parts first and then reflow them. Once that is done, I make standoffs using M3 screws with some nuts, and then place components on the top side (take note of screws I used to make standoffs):

As you can see, the top side has many parts, so by the time I placed them all the board will long be cooled down to ambient temperature. So I wouldn't worry about that too much. Again, my comment was mostly referring to manual soldering of thru-hole parts after reflow.
I don't use any glue to hold bottom parts in place during second reflow, and so far no part has came off - I had everything from tiny 0201 to quite large "type D" (size 2917 IRC) sized parts (see first photo). Surface tension of molten solder is quite strong and keeps all these parts in place.
Granted, I didn't try doing the same thing with parts in BGA package - for those you will probable need some glue. More experienced colleagues will hopefully pitch in and share their experience in that area - I would love to know that as it would allow me to make my boards more compact. For now I try to avoid placing anything other than passives on the bottom side - mostly out of concern that they would fall off/move and create shorts underneath, but also because I don't want to subject sensitive (and expensive) parts to second reflow if I can help it. At the end of the day, even if some of passives would come off, I can always solder them back into place manually, but this isn't so for things like QFN, or BGA.
 
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Offline xzswq21Topic starter

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #22 on: January 31, 2018, 06:12:22 pm »
If you have good quality PCB material you don't have to worry about reflow soldering.
e.g. Eurocircuits use Isola IS 400 or Technolam NP-155F board (TG150) that delaminate at 260°C more than 1 hour.
http://www.isola-group.com/wp-content/uploads/data-sheets/is400.pdf
https://www.eurocircuits.com/wp-content/uploads/ec2015/ecImage/document/NP155F-D-5-2012.pdf

In case of china board the base material could be a big question and risk.

There is a company in Bulgaria who do cheap PCB's (and the price for components is the best I could find in EU: actually the prices for passive are sometimes better than China and from good manufacturers, too). It's called Comet Electronics. http://www.comet.bg/?cid=92

They do not do BGA's so for our need we ended up doing the PCB's for prototypes with EuroCircuits. But EuroCircuits might not fit in your idea of cheap.

what do you think about EuroCircuits quality?
I have looked many companies but EuroCircuits has a good trad-off between the price and quality and other options.
most of companies like Analog devices, Linear,... have been using FR408 material, but I couldn't find any suitable manufacturer for my prototype PCB.
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Offline mars01

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Re: FR-4 TG material
« Reply #23 on: February 02, 2018, 11:51:10 am »
There is a company in Bulgaria who do cheap PCB's (and the price for components is the best I could find in EU: actually the prices for passive are sometimes better than China and from good manufacturers, too). It's called Comet Electronics. http://www.comet.bg/?cid=92

They do not do BGA's so for our need we ended up doing the PCB's for prototypes with EuroCircuits. But EuroCircuits might not fit in your idea of cheap.

what do you think about EuroCircuits quality?
I have looked many companies but EuroCircuits has a good trad-off between the price and quality and other options.
most of companies like Analog devices, Linear,... have been using FR408 material, but I couldn't find any suitable manufacturer for my prototype PCB.

It's difficult to give you a definitive answer because your boards will have, most likely, different requirements than mine. I did 6 layers boards, ENIG, blind/buried vias, 0.3mm holes and they were OK but I had no need for controlled impedance so I can't tell how this will be.
 


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