An Intelligent Ultrasonic Scanning System for Automatic Circuit Card Fault Detection

Several nonintrusive methods exist to detect faults, such as delaminations, broken leads, traces, and solder joints, and popcorn cracks on circuit cards and integrated circuits (IC). Ultrasonic scanning is widely utilized by IC manufacturers for this purpose. However, these failure analysis systems require skilled engineers to operate them. ORINCON proposes to demonstrate the feasibility of automatically detecting circuit card and IC faults using ultrasonic scanning. In Phase I, we will apply signal and image processing techniques for optimum feature extraction and intelligent system techniques to automatically detect features representing faults. The system will be generalized to allow the user to scan an example good card and subsequently scan a problematic card to detect faults. This system will be based on two commercial off-the-shelf components: ORINCON'S RIPPEN signal and image processing software and SONIXs HS 1000 HiSpeed acoustic scanning microscope. The ORINCON-SONIX team is uniquely qualified to perform this research. ORINCON possesses extensive experience in similar problems involving rotating machinery fault detection, medical ultrasound, and underwater acoustics. SONIX is a world leader in the development of ultrasonic inspection systems for integrated circuit failure analysis. In Phase II, the system will be refined and manufacturing plans will be developed.