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Studies on Reliability of Polymer Thick Film Resistors By Using Pulse Voltage Trimming Method (PVTM)
Poornaiah Billa and Y. Srinivasa Rao

This investigation is undertaken to determine the reliability of untrimmed and pulse voltage trimmed polymer thick film resistors by determining the potential failure mechanism and the mean time-to failure. Different drift functions are described for untrimmed and pulse voltage trimmed polymer thick film resistors with different conductor-insulator compositions. The values of the functional parameters depend strongly on the storage test temperature. The mean-to-failure of the untrimmed and pulse voltage trimmed polymer thick film resistors are calculated using Pranchou’s model for reliability prediction of thick film resistors.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to study the stability of polymer thick film resistors by using Pulse Voltage Trimming Method (PVTM).

Design / methodology / approach: The research work is proposed to explain the observed variations when polymer thick film resistors undergoes stability tests.

Findings: The variations of stability with short term drift tests and long term storage tests are explained quantitatively and found that higher composition polymer thick film resistors are having smallest variations which is attributed to the higher compositions of insulator.

Originality / Value: The variation of stability with short term drift tests and long term storage tests has been explained with the help of experiments. And also the effects of Pulse Voltage Trimming Method (PVTM) on the stability of polymer thick film resistors have been evaluated with the help of experiments.

Keywords: Stability, Polymer thick film resistors, Aging, Thermal Cycling, Humidity

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