60mil DiClad 880 Printed Circuit Board With Immersion Gold Plating For Digital Radio Antennas

Today, we'll discuss high-frequency PCBs built on DiClad 880 substrates.

Rogers DiClad 880 laminates are PTFE-based composites reinforced with woven fiberglass. They offer lower dielectric constant (Dk) and dissipation factors (Df), making them ideal for applications like filters, couplers, and low noise amplifiers that require precise dielectric constant uniformity. They are also suitable for power dividers and combiners that demand low loss.

Now, let's explore the properties of DiClad 880 in more detail.

DiClad 880 is a woven fiberglass reinforced, PTFE-based material that doesn't contain ceramic fillers. Its dielectric constant is adjusted by carefully balancing the ratio of PTFE and fiberglass. By reducing the content of woven fiberglass and increasing the ratio of PTFE, DiClad 880 achieves a lower DK value of 2.17 or 2.2 at 10 GHz, along with a lower dissipation factor of 0.0009 @ 10 GHz. However, it's important to note that this material may have slightly less dimensional stability compared to higher DK materials.

In terms of thermal properties, DiClad 880 has a relatively poor thermal coefficient of dielectric constant (TCDk) of -160 ppm/°C due to the absence of ceramic fillers. Additionally, its coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) in the Z-axis is higher at 252 ppm/°C, resulting in a thermal conductivity of 0.26 W/mK.

The peel strength is 14 lbs/inch after thermal stress, indicating strong adhesion to copper.

Moreover, both the volume resistivity and surface resistivity are excellent, with volume resistivity measuring at 1.4 x 10^9 MΩ-cm and surface resistivity measuring at 2.9 x 10^6 MΩ.

It also exhibits an arc resistance of over 180 seconds.

DiClad 880 demonstrates impressive mechanical properties, including tensile modulus, tensile strength, compressive modulus, and flexural modulus.

The dielectric breakdown value exceeds 45 kilovolts, and the material density is 2.23 g/cm³.

It meets UL94-V0 flammability standards and has a low water absorption rate of 0.02%.

DiClad 880 exhibits excellent outgassing properties, with a low total mass loss of 0.01%, well within the maximum threshold of 1%. The collected volatile condensable material has a maximum limit of 0.10% and a low value of 0.01%. Additionally, it has a water vapor regain rate of 0.01%, indicating resistance to water vapor absorption. It doesn't release any visible condensate during use.

These characteristics demonstrate that DiClad 880 is highly stable, reliable, and has excellent outgassing characteristics.

Now, let's discuss our PCB capabilities with DiClad 880 material. We offer single-sided, double-sided, multilayer, and hybrid PCBs with various layer counts. The dielectric thickness options include 20mil (0.508mm), 30mil (0.762mm), and 60mil (1.524mm). We also provide copper weights of 1oz (35µm) and 2oz (70µm) for design flexibility.

The PCB size is limited to 400mm by 500mm but can be customized to fit different applications. We offer solder mask options in colors such as green, black, blue, yellow, and red.

The surface finish of DiClad 880 PCBs is customizable, with options like immersion gold, HASL, immersion silver, immersion tin, bare copper, OSP, and pure gold plated.

On the screen, you can see an example of a 60mil DiClad 880 PCB with immersion gold plating, designed for digital radio antennas. DiClad 880 PCBs are versatile and find applications in radar feed networks, commercial phased array networks, low-loss base station antennas, guidance systems, and more.

In conclusion, DiClad 880 is compatible with traditional electroless copper and direct deposit metallization processes. It can be easily fabricated using standard equipment and chemical processes for plating, imaging, and etching circuit patterns. Most surface finishes, such as HASL, tin, silver, nickel/gold, and OSP, have been successfully applied to DiClad 880 without any issues or special concerns.

Thank you for reading, and we look forward to seeing you again next time.