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Anomalous Growth of the Alloy Whiskers and Hillocks in a Sn-Pb Coating on Al Substrate

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Abstract

Microalloying of elemental Pb is recognized in the electronics industry as the most effective and reliable method for mitigating whisker growth. However, in this study, Pb was not found to mitigate whisker growth in a Sn coating on an Al substrate. Pb addition resulted in the rapid growth of alloy whiskers and hillocks consisting of Sn phases and Pb phases on Sn-xPb coatings. The grain size was refined by increasing the Pb content, and the addition of a minor quantity of Pb changed the grain structure from a monolayer columnar structure to a multilayer equiaxed structure. Increasing the quantity of added Pb led to a higher whisker density on the coatings. The thermal stress in the coatings was heterogeneously distributed during aging. The Sn-Pb eutectic phase in the coatings was under high compressive stress and was therefore prone to whisker growth. Alloy whiskers and hillocks started to grow from the independent Pb phases during the initial aging stage. A long aging period resulted in the formation of massive Pb phases at the roots of the alloy hillocks due to Ostwald ripening. Some alloying elements are recommended that could be useful for mitigating whisker growth.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the grants of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51731004) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (3212002002C3).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Wuxi Zhongwei High-Tech Electronics Co., Ltd., Wuxi, 214100, China

    Shuang Tian, Xin Yao, Jianfeng Wang & Bo Wang

  2. China Key System & Integrated Circuit Co., Ltd., Wuxi, 214026, China

    Shuang Tian, Xin Yao, Jianfeng Wang & Bo Wang

  3. School of Materials Science and Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, 211189, China

    Jian Zhou & ZhengMing Sun

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  1. Shuang Tian
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Tian, S., Yao, X., Wang, J. et al. Anomalous Growth of the Alloy Whiskers and Hillocks in a Sn-Pb Coating on Al Substrate. J. Electron. Mater. 52, 1977–1989 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11664-022-10160-5

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