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Particularly during the past ten years, the mobile communications industry has grown by orders of magnitude, fueled by digital and RF circuit fabrication improvements, new large scale circuit integration, and other miniaturization technologies that make portable equipment smaller, cheaper, and more reliable. A key area within the telecommunication industry covers base stations and switch systems. Communications providers now require systems that provide significantly increased switching capacity. Combining both increased capability with size reduction is resulting in smaller printed circuit boards (PCBs) with more components placed on them. A potential solution to this is to embed some of the components within the board. The components which would be suitable for such a transition would be passives such as resistors, capacitors and inductors. This paper describes the work done in designing and manufacturing a PCB for the telecommunications industry with embedded resistors and microvias.

Fired resistors exhibit variations which are minimised by abrasive and laser trimming. The latter may cause unstable behaviour which is further aggravated by thermal shock. The chemical structure of a thick film resistor is analysed with respect to mechanical stress, and the theoretical conclusion that the coefficient of thermal expansion of the resistor should be equal to or smaller than that of the substrate is verified experimentally. The thermal behaviour of ruthenium dioxide is examined and a range of CTE values are determined for materials of varying chemical composition. The relationship between CTE and post laser trimming stability is demonstrated on four thick film resistors which differ in thermal expansion. It is pointed out that formulations with high metallic content can absorb tensile stress by elastic deformation, thus minimising the formation or propagation of laser induced cracks.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of parameters of embedded resistive elements manufacturing process as well as the influence of environmental factors on their electrical resistance. The investigations were made in comparison to the similar constructions of discrete chip resistors assembled to standard printed circuit boards (PCBs).

The investigations were based on the thin-film resistors made of NiP alloy, thick-film resistors made of carbon or carbon-silver inks as well as chip resistors in 0402 and 0603 packages. The polymer thick-film resistive films were screen-printed on the several types finishing materials of contact terminations such as copper, silver, and gold. To determine the sensitivity of embedded resistors versus standard assembled chip resistors on environmental exposure, the climatic chamber was used. The measurements of resistance were carried out periodically during the tests, and after the exposure cycles.

The results show that the change of electrical resistance of embedded resistors, in dependence of construction and base material, is different and mainly not exceed the range of 3 per cent. The achieved results in reference to thin-film resistors are comparable with results for standard chip resistors. However, the results that were obtained for thick-film resistors with Ag and Ni/Au contacts are similar. It was not found the big differences between resistors with and without conformal coating.

The studies show that embedded resistors can be used interchangeably with chip resistors. It allows to save the area on the surface of PCB, occupied by these passive elements, for assembly of active elements (ICs) and thus enable to miniaturization of electronic devices. But embedding of passive elements into PCB requires to tackle the effect of each forming process steps on the operational properties.

The technique of passive elements embedding into PCB is generally known; however, there are no detailed reports on the impact of individual process steps and environmental conditions on the stability of their electrical resistance. The studies allow to understand the importance of each factor process and the mechanisms of operational properties changes depending on the used materials.

The growth in digital telecom systems around the world has led to an increase in demand for surge protection components. These components often use low ohm resistor compositions in a serpentine configuration. The demands placed upon these materials during pulsing are high. Not only are the materials expected to withstand more severe pulses, they are also expected to have minimal adverse effect on the environment. To meet these increased demands, a new system of surge resistor materials has been developed. The design, manufacture and testing of these materials ensures optimum performance in high voltage surge applications. This paper describes the performance of this new surge resistor system and discusses how the performance of the resistors relates to the paste constituents, encapsulant materials and the laser trimming process.

Embedded passives technologies can provide benefits of size, performance, cost, and reliability to high density, high‐speed designs. A number of embedded passive technology solutions are available to the designer. Based on our experience with Rohm and Haas's thin‐film, high‐ohmic, InSite^TM embedded resistor materials (500 and 1000 Ω/sq), this paper provides some guidelines for selecting the appropriate embedded resistor technology and implementing it at a board fabricator. The design of embedded resistors, and the trade‐offs between resistor size, tolerance, and capability of board fabrication processes, are analyzed in detail. This paper also discusses selection of the appropriate embedded capacitor technology and introduces some initial results on Rohm and Haas's thin‐film, high‐D_k, InSite embedded capacitor material (200 nF/cm²).

Polymer thick film (PTF) resistors have been effectively used for many years in consumer goods like timers, motor controls, computers and a wide variety of high performance equipment. The potential for this technology has reached only a small portion of the market; its full potential is still to be determined. The cost savings relationship of printed resistors should be considered by factoring the design and the number of resistors printed. Printed resistor savings vs discrete component costs can be a factor of three. This is dependent on the number of printed resistors per board of the same sheet resistance (based on 400 printed resistors of the same sheet resistant values on a 18 × 24 panel vs discrete components). By minimising the printing operations, resistor costs will be effectively controlled. Resistive ranges of thick film material are from 1 ohm to 10 Mega Ohm.The printing quality of resistors may vary from 10‐20%; however, resistors may be trimmed to 1% in value. Many values of resistors may be achieved with the same decade of resistor pastes. The determining factor is the design and layout of the circuit. The power rating of the printed resistor is proportional to the geometric surface area and is highly dependent on the substrate selection. The ability for resistors to be printed and buried into the multilayer will give design engineers more flexibility in active circuit density. Up to a 30% increase in surface area may be realised if resistors are buried into the inner layer of the PCB or under other surface components.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the thermal behaviour of thin- and thick-film resistor with different dimensions and contacts embedded into printed circuit board (PCB) and compare them to the similar constructions of discrete chip resistors assembled to standard PCBs.

In investigations the thin- and thick-film embedded resistors with the bar form in different dimensions and configurations of contacts as well as rectangular chip resistors in package 0603 and 0402 were used. In tests were carried out the measurements of dissipated power in temperature of resistor about 40°C, 70°C and 155°C. The power dissipation was calculated as a multiplying of electrical current flowing through the resistor with voltage across the resistor. The dissipation of heat generated by electrical current flowing through resistors was examined by means of the FLIR A320 thermographic camera with lens Closeup×2 and the power source.

The results show that, in case of chip resistors, the intensity of heat radiation strongly depends on dimensions of copper contact lands and also depends on the dimensions of the resistor. In case of embedded resistors, with comparable dimensions to chip resistors, they have lower ability to power dissipation, as well as the copper contact lands dimensions have lower influence. The thermal radiation through resin material is not as effective as it is in case of resistors assembled on PCB. However, the embedded thick-film resistors, especially made of paste Minico M2010, have already the similar parameters to 0402 chip resistors.

Research shows that embedded resistors can be used interchangeably with SMD resistors it allows to open up space on the surface of PCB, but it should be taken into account the lower energy dissipation capabilities. It is suggested that further studies are necessary for accurately determining the thermal effects and investigate the structures of embedded passive components that allow for better heat management.

Thermal stability of embedded resistors during operation is a critical factor of success of embedded resistor technology. The way of power dissipation and heat resistance are one of the important operating parameters of these components. The results provide information about the power and the energy dissipation of embedded thin- and thick-film resistors compared to the standard surface mount technology.

The purpose of this paper is to study high-voltage interactions in polymer thick-film resistors, namely, polyvinyl chloride (PVC)-graphite thick-film resistors, and their applications in universal trimming of these resistors.

The authors applied high voltages in the form of pulses and impulses of various pulse durations and with different amplitudes to polymer thick-film resistors and observed the variation of resistance of these resistors with high voltages.

The paper finds that high voltages can be used for trimming of polymer thick-film resistors in both directions, i.e. upwards and downwards.

The research implication of this paper is that polymer thick-film resistors can be trimmed downwards or upwards practically using this method.

The practical implications of this paper is that one can trim the polymer thick-film resistors, namely, PVC–graphite thick-film resistors, in both directions, i.e. upwards and downwards, by using this method.

The value of the paper is in showing that high voltages can be used to trim downwards and also upwards in the case of polymer thick-film resistors. This type of trimming is called universal trimming, developed first time for polymer thick-film resistors.

The direct overlapping of thick film NTC thermistors and resistors was attempted to enable the trimming of NTC thermistors to relatively narrow tolerances with little influence on beta factors. Different combinations of 1 kohm/□ thick film NTC material (4993, Remex) and 1 and 10 kohm/□RuO2 and ruthenate based thick film resistors (HS‐80 series, Du Pont), fired either together or separately, were tested. The sheet resistivities, TCR and beta factors of these combinations were measured. Microstructures were investigated by SEM and analysed by EDS. The results, i.e., the large decrease of sheet resistivities (up to ten times) and a resistivity vs. temperature dependence which changed from negative to positive TCR for some combinations, indicate the interaction between NTC materials and resistors during the firing process. These interactions are more distinctive for materials fired together. In all cases the beta factors were lower than calculated. Based on these experiments, the ‘best’ thick film resistor paste for NTC/resistor combination (HS‐8041, Du Pont) was chosen. Several layouts with partially or entirely overlapped NTC thermistors/resistors were designed. Unprotected, glass protected or organic protected circuits were laser trimmed. The resistivities and beta factors were measured as a function of resistor geometries and laser cut lengths. The results obtained demonstrated that NTC thermistors, partially overprinted with an ‘ordinary’ thick film resistor, can be trimmed to tolerances around 0.5% without any special precautions during trimming.

A new model for thick film resistor calculation accounts for the physical effects which make variations in local sheet resistivity and local volume resistivity: geometry and terminal diffusion effects. Taking the criterion of homogeneity in the observations of local resistivity, a resistor is transformed geometrically and electrically into equivalent modular parts. Comparing the resistor transformed by equivalent geometrical and electrical transformation (EGET) with an ideal resistor a new semi‐empirical formula for thick film resistor calculation was evaluated. This model takes into account the technological process which makes possible more accurate resistor projection compared with other models.