Effect of Adding Titanium Oxide Nanoparticles on Some Physical Properties of a Ternary Tin-Antimony-Indium solder alloy

Abstract

The present study basically covers studying the effect of adding TiO2 nanoparticles on thermal, structural and mechanical properties of Sn-5wt% Sb-2wt% In (SSI52) solder alloy. Three topics are discussed: 1) Studying the effect of 0.22%TiO2 nanoparticles addition on thermal and microstructure characteristics of SSI52 ordinary solder. 2) Studying the effect of strain rate e\ and testing temperatures T on the stress-strain characteristics of SSI52 ordinary and SSI52 composite wire samples. 3) Studying indentation creep characteristics of the two solder alloys under effect of different aging temperature. The experimental results were examined under different loads. In the first topic, Thermal analysis and microstructure evolutions of both the ordinary solder SSI52 and SSI52- 0.22 wt.% nano-sized TiO2 composite solder was discussed. Thermal properties of the selected solder alloys have been studied by using the differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and the microstructure was examined by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer (EDS). Phase identification of the alloy samples was carried out by X- ray diffractometry (XRD). The results showed that the observed endothermic peaks of the SSI52 ordinary solder and SSI52 composite solder were found shifted from 238.46 to 238.99 oC. A touch small variation within the melting temperature (0.53 oC) after incorporating the TiO2 NP within the ordinary alloy. Microstructural analysis revealed that InSn and SbSn IMC particles and the P-Sn phase were detected in both SSI52 ordinary and SSI52 composite solders. Addition of 0.22 wt.% TiO2 nanoparticles yields uniform dispersion of these IMCs within the Sn-rich mixture producing a fine network like microstructure with the P-Sn.