CAF Characteristics of FR-4 Printed Circuit Board (PCB) for Automotive Electronics

Recently, application of automotive electronics is rapidly on the increase and consumption of PCB (printed circuit board), which is applied to compose of electrical circuit, is also rising rapidly in automotive. During the term of guarantee in automotive, reliability of car electronics must to be verified and especially research of CAF (conductive anodic filament) characteristics to have an influence on insulation degradation of PCB is demanded. CAF is different with electrochemical metallic ion migration. CAF is generated at the anodic Cu (copper) interlayer and grow in the direction of cathode Cu interlayer, finally lead to short failure between multiplayer of automotive electronics. Thus, in this research, CAF characteristics is quantitatively evaluated and compared with raw materials of FR-4 PCB, respectively. From these results, failure mechanism and a preventive measure is showed. Consequently, this research is expected to contribute to improve the reliability of automotive electronics.