Steve, I echo what Joe has already said. This amount of gold should not be a problem for gold wire bonding unless the components have not attained bonding temperature (on the order of 150C), or something is moving/softening during bonding. Even aluminum wire should bond well to this amount of gold - but also as Joe indicated, the long term reliability may be of some question. See if the Customer can share a bit more info with you as to the type of bonding performed, temperatures, and the type of problems experienced. Steve Creswick - Gentex -----Original Message----- From: Steve Kelly [mailto:[log in to unmask]] Sent: Saturday, June 22, 2002 11:22 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [TN] Wire bondable gold We made some flex circuits for a customer and wound up putting too much gold on - approx. 75 microinches. The nickel is averaging 153. The gold meets all the purity specs. Under the wire bond area is a large heat sink. My customer is having difficulties wire bonding. Is too much gold a problem or can the heat sink cause issues. Regards Steve Kelly -------------------------- Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (www.BlackBerry.net) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- 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 the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/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 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 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 the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/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 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------