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Coating Materials for Electronic Applications |
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This book was this year's Christmas holiday reading, while sitting under a palm tree and between diving, beach volleyball and archery.
There are not many books available on coatings for electronic assemblies and particularly conformal coating, which is the main reason I was sent this book for review. I must admit at this point to skipping through most of the chemistry and material properties section as it was heavy going and probably above this reviewer's knowledge. The publisher has a wide range of books in the area of coating, materials, application and also specifically in the semiconductor market.
It is becoming more common to conformally coat board assemblies to add a final layer of protection to the board or to improve the stability of the circuit during operation. It is difficult to select the correct coating for an application. The issue is mainly what will provide suitable protection at the right cost per product. There is also the issue of the process equipment for application or do you just ship all the products out to a contract service.
The book consists of 7 chapters, appendix and index which spans a total of 530 pages and is illustrated with diagrams, tables and photographs. There could have been more photographs particularly process examples, masking methods and examples of both good and poor coating. There are very few references in industry as to what is good, acceptable or a reject for coatings applied by different methods. Inspection methods were covered using different methods with their limitations.
Overall each of the sections did explain the coating process in detail and the benefits of each system. There were sections not specifically related to printed board assembly but it was interesting to see the wide range of applications currently using coatings for protection.
The book also covered the environmental changes which the coating industry has had to undertake. This relates not only to the materials used to coat but the materials used to clean products prior to coating. It is very common to have problems with coating adhesion when care has not been taken to clean a product. Alternatively if the compatibility of the coating does not allow proper adhesion electrical failure can occur.