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Gold ball wire bonding
18Jun

The Attributes of Gold Ball Wire Bonding

CST provides both manual and automated gold ball bonding, and manual aluminum wedge bonding on Printed Circuit Boards (PCB), Printed Circuit Flex (PCF) and other unique packages. Gold ball wire bonding is the current industry standard in the business with over 90% of all IC assembly in semiconductor packages is manufactured using gold ball wire bonding processes.

While aluminum wedge wire bonding uses an ultrasonic process, which relies on ultrasonic friction generated by a transducer for bonding, gold wire bonding uses a thermosonic process which has the following attributes:

  • “Omnidirectional” wire bonding process – the wire can go in any direction from the top of the ball on the first bond to the second bond on the substrate.
  • Requires temperature of 150C on the substrate or package during wire bonding.
  • Gold wire diameter of 0.7mil/18um, 0.8mil/20um, 1.0mil/25um, 1.25mil/32um, 1.5mil/38um and 2.0mil/50um are most common.
  • Minimum wire bond pitch is 45um.
  • PCB Electrolytic Gold Plating per MIL-G-4-45204C: Purity: Type III, 99.9% minimum gold, Grade A: 90 Knoop maximum hardness, Class 1: 30-50 micro inches (0.75-1.25 microns) of soft bondable gold.
  • CST recommends PCB Gold Plating: ENEPIG (Electroless Nickel, Electroless Palladium, Immersion Gold. 120-200 micro inches (3 – 5 microns) of Nickel, 3-6 micro inches (0.08 – 0.15 microns) of Palladium, 3-6 micro inches (0.08 – 0.15 microns) of Gold.
  • Substrate/ Package limited to 2.2” (56mm) X-axis x 3.0” (76mm) Y-axis.
  • Ball size is approximately 2 to 3 times the wire diameter.
  • Bond size should not exceed 75% of the IC pad size.
  • Loop heights of 150um – 200um are most common, with a minimum 100um.
  • Loop length is typically less than 100 times the wire diameter.
  • Most used aluminum wire diameters are 1.0mil/25um, 2.0mil/50um.

Get Gold Ball Wire Bonding for Your Electronic Manufacturing Services

Cascade Systems Technology provides gold ball wire bonding for quality electronic manufacturing services for customers all over the world. Learn why we are the premier electronic contract manufacturing companies in the world by emailing us at info@cascadesystems.net, calling us at (503) 640-5733, or get a quote using our simple online Express Quote form.

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