Enhanced Thermal Conductivity Ceramic Filled PTFE/Woven Fiberglass Laminate for Microwave Printed Circuits Boards TC350 is a woven fiberglass reinforced, ceramic filled, PTFE-based composite for use as a printed circuit board substrate. TC350 is designed to provide enhanced heat-transfer through “Best-In-Class” thermal conductivity, while reducing dielectric loss and insertion loss. Lower losses result in higher Amplifier and Antenna Gains/Efficiencies. The increased thermal conductivity of TC350 provides higher power handling, reduces hot-spots and improves device reliabil- ity. This higher heat transfer within the substrate complements designs using coins, heat sinks or thermal vias to provide designers additional design margin in managing heat. In designs with limited thermal management options, TC350 significantly improves heat transfer where the primary thermal path is through the laminate. This results in reduced junction temperatures and extends the life of active components, which is critical for improving power amplifier reliability, extending MTBF and reducing warranty costs. In addition, lower operating temperatures and chip-matching thermal expansion characteristics provide better reliability for component attachment prone to solder fatigue, solder softening and joint failure. TC350 has excellent Dielectric Constant Stability across a wide temperature range. This helps Power Amplifier and Antenna designers maximize gain and minimize dead bandwidth lost to dielectric constant drift as operating temperature changes. Dielectric constant stability is also critical to phase and imped- ance sensitive devices such as network transformers utilized for impedance matching networks utilized in power amplifier circuitry or in Wilkinson Power Dividers. TC350 has low Z-Direction CTE which matches copper. This feature provides unsurpassed plated through hole reliability. TC350 is a “soft substrate” and relatively insensitive to stress from vibration and impact from today’s drop testing requirements. TC350 enjoys a strong bond to copper, utilizing microwave grade, low profile copper. Unlike ceramic hydrocarbons that need to utilize “toothy copper” to achieve acceptable bond, TC350 utilizes relatively smooth copper. This results in even lower insertion loss due to skin effect losses of copper that are more obvious at higher RF and microwave frequencies.
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