Thanks, Everyone. I've passed the responses along to the engineer with my repeated warning that this is a bad solution. What really worries me is that apparently it's been used before in our products without my knowledge. Oh well, no smoke yet, I guess. Thanks for the excellent support, everyone! Bob Croslin The Nielsen Company -----Original Message----- From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Thayer, Wayne - IIW Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 9:32 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [TN] Removing BGA Pads for Routing Clearance Hi Jerry- You are absolutely correct! Solder mask masks solder. Go figure! IT IS NOT AN INSULATOR! Been burned bad at least twice that way. But if you remove the spheres which no longer have pads, then you likely will have no problem passing qualification (except if you remove >20% of the balls, such as 1 of 4 balls on a transistor). When in doubt, consider underfill. Wayne Thayer -----Original Message----- From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jerry Dengler Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 3:19 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [TN] Removing BGA Pads for Routing Clearance Bob, Be afraid, be very afraid. The BGA should collapse slightly if it's properly reflowed. Now you will have solder balls touching the traces with just solder mask separating it. I know that I've read solder mask cannot be used as a insulator, but I do not remember where. Jerry Dengler -----Original Message----- From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Croslin, Robert Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 3:07 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [TN] Removing BGA Pads for Routing Clearance Dear 'Netters, I have an engineer laying out a very small board using a .050 pitch 113 pin BGA with two rows. He's trying to rout out from the inside row and in order to avoid using a via, wants to delete the two adjacent pads for routing space. If he does, the balls that would have met with those pads will have about a 2 mil overlay on the routed trace. We'll be using an LPI mask and I've told him he could risk bridging from the solder bump should the mask crack during reflow. He then told me our former designer had used that trick before, but wasn't sure on which product. We've never had a field failure related to that condition, but it sure made me cringe. My question is how concerned should I be with this arrangement? Bob Croslin The Nielsen Company ______________________________________________________________________ This email has been scanned by the MessageLabs Email Security System. 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