Energy Efficiency Investigation on High-Pressure Convection Reflow Soldering in Electronics Production

One of the key factors in efficient and defect-free electronics manufacturing is the soldering of electronic components to the printed circuit boards. The deciding factor in the reliability and lifetime of the product is the quality of the soldered interconnections. The setting up of the reflow soldering profile plays a crucial role in the electrical functionality and robustness of the product. Especially the miniaturization of the assemblies and the development of new materials make it inevitable for the definition of new processes, optimization and implementation. In this paper, the combination of over-pressure and convection reflow soldering to minimize the defect rate and the related energy analysis for energy efficiency will be discussed and presented. A statistical analysis with variations in solder time, cost, energy, quality trade-off in the over-pressure reflow soldering process for classical printed circuit boards (PCBs) has been demonstrated.