11.05.2022 / News

The dangers of humidity for electronic components

Moisture is an invisible “parasite” that can cause serious injury to electronic components if they are not handled and stored properly.

Once removed from their original protective packaging, electronic components, including LEDs as well as PCB printed circuits, absorb moisture from the environment. During the remelting process, the high temperature causes the evaporation of the water absorbed by them. The steam under pressure expands quickly and generates internal forces that cause swelling (“pop corn” effect) with consequent development of micro cracks in the body of the component, internal delaminations between chips and plastic body, interruptions in the electrical interconnections between chip and lead-frame. Over time, there may also be potential corrosion caused by moisture that penetrates the damaged casings.

In the case of printed circuits, moisture is responsible for defects in external delamination of the solder mask, also called “blistering” . Especially in the presence of a multilayer circuit, humidity can also generate internal delaminations that are difficult to identify such as the detachment and interruption of the various layers of the circuit. The separation of the various layers of the base material can generate fractures along the metallization (barrel cracking) . These fractures can interrupt the circuit or, in the best of cases, create intermittent malfunctions of the board due to the hot-cold thermal stress.