A new stamped spring pin socket from Ironwood Electronics addresses high performance requirements for testing ball-grid array (BGA) 361 - CBT-BGA-7056. The contactor is a stamped spring pin with 31 gram actuation force per ball and cycle life of 125,000 insertions.
The self inductance of the contactor is 0.88 nH with an insertion loss <1 dB at 15.7 GHz and capacitance 0.097 pF. The current capacity of each contactor is 4 amps at 40 name="_Hlk51762081">° C temperature rise. Socket temperature range is -55 name="_Hlk51762081">° C to +180 name="_Hlk51762081"> name="_Hlk51762081">° C. The socket features a clamshell lid design for ease of chip replacement in the production environment and has an integrated compression plate for vertical force actuation without distorting device 
Source: Ironwood Electronicsposition.
The specific configuration of the package to be tested in the CBT-BGA-7056 is a BGA, 13 x 13 mm, 0.5 mm pitch 25 x 25 array with 361 balls. The socket is mounted using supplied hardware on the target PCB with no soldering, and uses the smallest footprint in the industry, allowing inductors, resistors and decoupling capacitors to be placed very close to the device for impedance tuning.
To use, place the BGA device into the socket and close the lid by snapping the latch. Vertical force is applied by turning the compression screw. A central hole enables a thermocouple to be placed close to the device top surface and the socket has a side hole where the heater can be placed to heat the device to a specific temperature. This socket can be used for quick device screening, device characterization at extreme temperatures as well as final production test.
