Solderable Polymer Thick-film Conductors for Low Temperature Substrates
Authors: Suh Seigi , Persons Ryan , Hargrove Doug , Berube Gregory 
Published: December 2018

For decades, polymer thick-film (PTF) systems have provided a low cost, non-fired option for screen-printing simple electronic circuits. The ability to apply these types of pastes on temperature sensitive substrates such as PET, polycarbonate, polyimide, and other polymers has facilitated a variety of applications, for instance membrane touch-switch keypads, buss bars for touch screens, various types of sensors, and flexible circuitry. Polymer thick-film is also one of the primary technology solutions utilized in the rapidly emerging Printed Electronic market, where flexible, durable materials are paramount to the success of these technologies. One of the largest emerging markets for polymer thick-film is wearable electronics, where engineers are designing “smart fabrics” with active circuitry for medical monitoring, performance enhancement in sports, and personal comfort. Polymer thick-film pastes include silver pastes for conductors, carbon pastes for resistive applications, silver-silver chloride fillers for glucose sensors, and dielectric pastes.

The major challenge with PTF silver conductors is that they are not conducive to soldering. This hinders the ability to attach components, leads, dies, wires, or other features to the prints. As copper is solderable, one possible solution would be a copper polymer thick-film metallization; however they start oxidizing at the typical paste curing temperatures, 110 – 130°C, rendering them unsuitable for the vast majority of conductive applications. In order to meet these challenges, Heraeus has developed a new line of solderable polymer thick-film conductors based on a high-performance silver-coated copper conductive filler. These metallizations are solderable, resistant to solder leaching, and result in sheet resistivities approaching that of pure silver polymer conductors. The prints do not degrade in performance when cured at temperatures as high as 200°C. The new product line was formulated to accept different types of solders, especially traditional SAC-305, which provides a complete matched solution for designers. The new metallization opens up new applications given its ability to print polymer circuitry on a variety of substrates including aluminum, steel, FR4, Kapton, Mylar, and glass. The technology also allows for the fabrication of more complex circuitry on these types of substrates, giving circuit designers a powerful new tool in their toolbox in applications such as LED lighting, sensors, and heaters. Finally, these materials may provide a lower-cost option for solderable flexible polymer end terminations for components used in vibration sensitive applications, for instance the automotive industry.

In our paper, we will present the properties of the new pastes and printed conductors. Performance testing includes surface resistivity, solderability, solder leach resistance, voiding, and adhesion on two substrates: FR4 and Kapton. Furthermore, we show that the solderable PTF conductor will provide a potential cost- savings over the current technology used on FR4 boards, stamped copper films. By replacing the stamped copper with our solderable PTF conductor, manufacturers will have the advantage of replacing a subtractive process for etching their patterns with an additive, environmentally friendly process, not only saving processing time but eliminating a large, dangerous copper waste stream. Finally, we will summarize the applications that the new technology enables.