Hi,
had a chat with NASA about a little tin whisker problem we had. Pure tin end caps on ceramic capacitors. Now, Sandra Winkler wrote that tin whiskers can grow on ALL tin alloys, not only pure tin, as some thought. Remedy is matte tin and tough disciplin in the plating organisation. I'll check with AVX and the others what solder they will use from  now on. Happened to read this last year:

"At the one-day joint MEPTEC (MicroElectronics Packaging & Test Engineering Council)/San Jose University Lead Free Summit on January 10, 2001, matte tin was universally supported by the attendees by the end of the session. Over 50 companies and nearly 100 individuals were represented. Remarkably, matte tin has made a comeback and will hopefully be here to stay." Sandra Winkler

Q: do you ask for matte tin on cercaps for both solder- and epoxy mounting?

/Regards/
Ingemar Hernefjord
Ericsson Microwave Systems

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