MECHANICAL FATIGUE AND SENSITIVITY STUDY OF A PRINTED CIRCUIT BOARD COMPONENT

Electronic equipment, which is widely used in military applications, must be able to survive harsh environments. The endurance of such equipment is defined by the durability of their internal sensitive components. Traditionally, vibration isolation of equipment having commercial of-the-shelf (COTS) electronics is achieved by means of vibration-shock isolators. However, the use of such vibration isolators has some disadvantages. Since most failures occur at mechanical joints such as solder joints and lead wires, ruggedization of sensitive electronic components mounted on PCB's are investigated in this study. Therefore vibration induced fatigue life analysis of an axial leaded aluminum capacitor is performed. Using Step Stress Testing method (SST) component fatigue capabilities, which are used as inputs in further numerical analysis, are obtained. Furthermore, sensitivity analysis for axial leaded capacitor is done in order to focus on the influence of some design parameters on the fatigue life. Finally, the effect of well-known ruggedization techniques in electronic industry like eccobond and silicone reinforcement on the fatigue life of the component is examined.