Daeil Kwon 1, Michael H. Azarian 2, and Michael Pecht 2
1Department of Human and System Engineering, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, Ulsan, 44949, Korea
2CALCE, Center for Advanced Life Cycle Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20740, USA
Abstract:
Solder joints are among the most common failure
sites in electronic assemblies. This paper presents a prognostic
approach that allows for the remaining useful life prediction of
solder joints using an RF impedance analysis and the Gaussian
process (GP) regression. While the solder joints were exposed
to a mechanical stress condition to generate fatigue failures, the
RF impedance of the solder joint was continuously monitored.
The RF impedance provided an early indication of the impending
solder-joint failure in the form of a gradual increase prior to
the end of life. A GP model was applied to the RF impedance
obtained from the fatigue tests in order to estimate the remaining
life of the solder joint in real time. It was demonstrated that
the GP model successfully predicted the time to failure of the
solder joint with high accuracy prior to failure. The prediction
performance was also evaluated using prognostic metrics.