Electronic components are essential to modern day life. They are used in everything from consumer products, to automotive entertainment systems, and to communication networks. The growing demand for components to be smaller, lighter and thinner via miniturization and higher-density packaging places greater requirements on performance & reliaibility.
The heat treatment process during production and changes in ambient & internal temperature during operation causes expansion and contraction, that induce warpage, within electronic components.
Since the majority of components consist of different materials, it is normal that thermal stresses develop along the connection interface due to material mismatch of the thermal expansion coefficients. As such, the testing of electronic components, after production and in active operation, is important to ensure product reliability under thermal loading.
Digital Image Correlation (DIC) is a non-contact, full-field, optical measurement technology that can be used to measure surface (contour) shape, displacement and strain yielding an in-plane and out-of-plane accuracy of between 1-5 µm. A stereoscopic DIC system used in conjunction with a heating stage can be used to measure thermal warpage (contour & displacement), but also the thermal strain and the coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) in any optically visible component.
