Testing times: Preventing water vapour from making electronics fail

Citation

(2007), "Testing times: Preventing water vapour from making electronics fail", Microelectronics International, Vol. 24 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/mi.2007.21824aad.004

Testing times: Preventing water vapour from making electronics fail

Testing times: Preventing water vapour from making electronics fail

From circuit boards to missiles and from ICs to enclosures, electronics are prone to failure in the presence of water. Although plastics, seals and enclosures are excellent at keeping liquid water out, many of them offer virtually no barrier to water vapour and it is often this that causes electronics to fail.

Versaperm Limited, a world leader in water vapour permeability, has launched a new way to measure this vapour permeability easily, quickly and accurately. It works on seals, enclosures, coatings and even mastics.

The new WVTR (water vapour transmission) MK VI meter's highly automated computerised control can cope with several samples at a time – and still give a reading in as little as 30min for some materials. The conventionally gravimetric measurement technique takes several days and gives significantly less accurate and reproducible results.

The MK VI can be accurate to better than one part per million (with some samples a few parts per hundred million). Sensitivities are typically in the range 0.05-3,200g/m²/day. Additionally the instrument can be configured to measure the diffusion rates of most gaseous elements (water, O₂, CO₂, etc.).

For further information, visit the web site: www.versaperm.co.uk