Patent ID: 7609072

Claim:
A method of conditioning and screening tantalum capacitors, the method comprising: for each tantalum capacitor to be tested, aging the capacitor by applying a plurality of series of voltage pulses across the capacitor to induce a plurality of series of surge currents through the capacitor, subsequent to aging the capacitor, applying a predetermined voltage across the capacitor and measuring leakage current flowing through the capacitor at predetermined intervals of time after the predetermined voltage has been applied across the capacitor, determining whether the capacitor is acceptable on the basis of the leakage current measurements taken for the capacitor, the capacitor being determined to be acceptable where the capacitor has a level of leakage current that is decreasing over time, or that is less than a predetermined current level at a selected one of the predetermined intervals of time, the capacitor being determined to not be acceptable where the capacitor has a level of leakage current that is increasing over time, or that is equal to or greater than the predetermined current level at the selected one of the predetermined intervals of time.