Schlötter on TPCA 2023

October 12th, 2023 | Stefanie Geldbach Dr. | News EN

The TPCA Show of the Taiwan Printed Circuit Association (TPCA) is one of the most important events in the electronics industry. The annual show presents the latest advances, products and services in the PCB industry and attracts professionals and companies from all over the world. The products of Dr.-Ing. Max Schlötter GmbH & Co. KG have been offered with great success in Taiwan for decades. This year, for the first time, Schlötter will have its own stand (Stand N, 519) at the TPCA Show, which will be held in Taipei from 25-27 October 2023. The Geislingen-based company is currently in the process of establishing a branch office, the Schlötter Taiwan Branch (愛爾蘭商施洛特有限公司台灣分公司 in Taipei. The branch will start operations at the end of the year. At the fair, Schlötter will present a range of current and new products for the PCB and electronics industry:

• The cleaners SLOTOCLEAN S 20, SLOTOCLEAN 40 and SLOTOCLEAN S 80, which have an excellent cleaning and wetting effect and are an important basic requirement for filling blind vias.
• The micro etches SLOTOCLEAN S 40 and SLOTETCH 5840, which combine deoxidation with a defined etch rate depending on the application.
• The copper baths SLOTOCOUP SF 50, SLOTOCOUP SF 80, which are used with great success for filling and metallising structures with different geometries (conductor tracks, blind vias, through holes). From current research and development, the new copper bath SLOTOCOUP SF 100 for further specialised applications will be presented.
• The copper bath SLOTOCOUP PRT 3300 (Pulse Reverse) achieves conformal coating of high aspect ratios.
• The tin baths SLOTOTIN 20-1, SLOTOTIN 40 and the new bisphenol-free tin bath SLOTOTIN MT 1460 exhibit high hiding power and etch resistance even at low coating thicknesses. At the same time, the deposited tin coatings have a very low tendency to whisker formation due to their grain structure and low carbon content.
• Newly developed processes and an optimised process sequence for ENIG (Electroless Nickel Gold) with excellent bath stabilities and long service lives.
• as well as a physical test bench developed together with iChemAnalytics to investigate whisker formation and tribological properties of coatings. The test stand is a world first and the tests can be carried out at different temperatures and in the absence of oxygen.

Schlötter also focuses on the CO2 footprint and explains the CO2 footprint of the products it offers and how CO2 emissions can be minimised when using Schlötter processes. The company has set itself the goal of becoming CO2 neutral by 2030 and would also like to support its customers and partners on this path.

We look forward to seeing you at stand N-519.

Superfilling and Direct Metallisation: Schlötter on TPCA 2019

October 3rd, 2019 | Julia Krämer | News EN

The annual TPCA Show in Taipeh is one of the world’s leading trade fairs for the PCB industry. More than 400 exhibitors and 4,000 visitors from 50 countries will get together in Taipeh on October 23-25, 2019 to gather information on current trends and issues. 5G networks, autonomous driving or integrated systems present the industry with new challenges. Schlötter will also participate in TPCA 2019: together with AGES, their long-year technology and sales partner in Taiwan, Schlötter will present various processes for superfilling, through-hole plating and direct metallisation from their current product range.

SLOTOCOUP SF 1960: Superfilling for Automotive Boards

With annual growth rates of approx. 6%, the automotive electronics industry is one the fastest growing areas of the electronics industry. The widespread use of  advanced driver assistance systems and the increasing significance of automated and connected driving create a stable demand. Schlötter’s copper electrolyte SLOTOCOUP SF 1960 was specifically developed for automotive boards and unites superfilling with an excellent throwing power and uniform deposition. SLOTOCOUP SF 1960 is operated with MMO anodes in standard VCP lines. With SLOTOCOUP SF 1960, it is possible to both fill larger blind vias completely (i.e. without voids) and to metallize through-holes with 0.3 mm in diameter and 1.6 mm in depth (aspect ratio 1:5) in one single process step.

Copper SLOTOCOUP SF 1960 was successfully launched in the market in the beginning of 2019 and is used in several installations in Asia.

SLOTOCOUP SF 50: Single-process solution for HDI PCBs

Miniaturisation and more complex circuits lead to high technical requirements to PCB design. HDI technology (HDI: High Density Interconnect) enables a compact, reliable printed circuit board design with significantly higher packing densities. HDI PCBs offer very fine traces structures (10 x 10 μm), the smallest holes and blind and buried microvias. Schlötter’s Copper SLOTOCOUP SF 50 can be used for all manufacturing steps of HDI multilayers, including the filling of through-holes in the core layer, BMV filling in inner layers and through-hole filling in outer layers.

Direct Metallisation in the Times of 5G

The higher frequencies inherent to 5G will pose a key challenge to PCB manufacturing. The more demanding performance parameters of 5G will require even greater care in the design and selection of PCB materials as the higher frequency mmWave systems are more sensitive to effects such as copper roughness, thickness variation and thermal dissipation. These requirements also lead to new direct metallisation processes, which are used to create a conductive layer on the substrate and have to ensure good adhesion of the subsequent copper layer. Schlötter’s product range includes three new processes for direct metallisation suitable for 5G materials: SLOTOSIT PCB 3500, SLOTOGO PCB 3600 and SLOTOSIT PCB 3800. In his talk Next Generation Metallisation Process for 5G, held at the Technology symposium of the Alliance of Micro- and Nano-Metallisation Technology on Friday, 25 October 2019, Dr. Stefan Henne (Schlötter) will present SLOTOSIT PCB 3800. Using SLOTOSIT PCB 3800, PCB substrates such as polyimide are activated in gaseous SO₃ without increasing the roughness of the surface which is especially important in order to minimise signal losses. First inhouse trials showed promising results.