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Failure and reliability analysis of a SiC power module based on stress comparison to a Si device

Failure and reliability analysis of a SiC power module based on stress comparison to a Si device

Lu, Hua ORCID: 0000-0002-4392-6562 and Bailey, Christopher ORCID: 0000-0002-9438-3879 (2017) Failure and reliability analysis of a SiC power module based on stress comparison to a Si device. IEEE Transactions on Device and Materials Reliability, 17 (4). pp. 727-737. ISSN 1530-4388 (doi:https://doi.org/10.1109/TDMR.2017.2766692)

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Abstract

The superior electro-thermal properties of SiC power devices permit higher temperature of operation and enable higher power density compared with silicon devices. Nevertheless, the reliability of SiC power modules has been identified as a major area of uncertainty in applications which require high reliability. Traditional power module packaging methods developed for silicon chips have been adopted for SiC and the different thermomechanical properties cause different fatigue stresses on the solder layer of the chip. In this paper a 2-D Finite Element (FE) model has been developed to evaluate the stress performance and lifetime of the solder layer for Si devices, which has been validated using accelerated power cycling tests on Si IGBTs. The proposed model was extrapolated for SiC devices of the same voltage and current rating using the same solder material and the results show that under the same cyclic power loss profile the induced stress and strain energy in the die attach layer is much higher and concentrates on the die/solder interfacial area for SiC chips. Using the validated stress-based model, the lifetime can be quantified when SiC chips are used. This ability to extrapolate the available power cycling and lifetime data of silicon chips to silicon carbide chips would be a key element for developing reliable packaging methods for SiC devices.

Item Type: Article
Uncontrolled Keywords: Stress comparison, silicon carbide, failure analysis, power cycling, life prediction
Subjects: Q Science > QA Mathematics
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group: Faculty of Engineering & Science > Centre for Numerical Modelling & Process Analysis (CNMPA)
Faculty of Engineering & Science > Centre for Numerical Modelling & Process Analysis (CNMPA) > Computational Mechanics & Reliability Group (CMRG)
Faculty of Engineering & Science > School of Computing & Mathematical Sciences (CMS)
Faculty of Engineering & Science
Last Modified: 04 Mar 2022 13:07
URI: http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/20213

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