Hi all, I have stumbled across a problem with heat dissapation on an RF type PCA. Our customer has designed the PCB with 0.3mm via's underneath various components, (power transistors), and now this is causing a thermal dissapation problem. The part manufacturer had the following suggestions... "Manufacturing suggestions, To properly use the parts in a manufacturing environment, it is recommended that an additional reflow process is used to ensure solder has filled the thermal vias beneath the part. The steps are as follows: 1. Apply solder paste to area containing thermal vias. 2. Reflow the board and the solder paste will wick through the via holes. 3. Cover the backside of the board beneath the power amplifier with Kapton tape and reflow the part to the board. The solder will remain in the via holes and the power amplifier will be properly connected to the thermal/ground pad below it." Is anyone performing such a process??? What implications and problems does anyone have with trying to gasket the stencil over these filled via's??? What other issues are there? Cheers Mike --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8d To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet To temporarily halt delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search previous postings at: www.ipc.org > On-Line Resources & Databases > E-mail Archives Please visit IPC web site http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5315 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------