An Insight into Types of Semiconductor Plastic Used in the Semiconductor Industry

1. An Insight into Types of Semiconductor Plastic Used in the Semiconductor Industry

2. Introduction • Semiconductors are widely used all across the world in a variety of products, especially in building electronic chips and equipment. • The material used for making semiconductors need to fulfill multiple crucial conditions such as dust resistant, fire resistant, heat resistant and chemical resistant. • Plastic is one such material whose properties can be modified to suit the needs of a semiconductor material. • The following slides showcase some popular variants of semiconductor plastic.

3. High Density Polyethylene (HDPE) • As the name suggests, this plastic variant has high density polymer that lends it incredible strength. • HDPE is also resistant to strong chemicals such as acids, making it a perfect candidate for use as semiconductor plastic. • HDPE plastic is highly versatile and malleable, so it can be used to create almost any kind of semiconductor part. • Another benefit is that the material is considerably lower than many other plastic variants, making it a very economical solution for most semiconductor manufacturing needs.

4. Polypropylene • Polypropylene is another good choice for use as a semiconductor plastic because of its high resistance to strong chemicals such as acids and bases. • Polypropylene shares most of its properties with HDPE, but its major advantage lies in the fact that it is slightly less expensive than HDPE, which makes it a great material to create workstations areas with. • Due to its lower cost, Polypropylene is a great option to make the plastic components that not only go into chip making, but also the environment where the chips the semiconductors are manufactured.

5. Polycarbonate • Polycarbonate is an extremely strong variant of plastic which offers many differentiating features over its substitutes such as HDPE and polypropylene. • While polycarbonate is not very malleable, owing to its strong exterior after it is fully processed, the hard surface makes it perfect for use in making plastic pipes, plastic tubes, valves for machines and filtration materials to be used in machineries and vents. • Another aspect of polycarbonate is that they can be modified on-site in terms of dimensions, so they can be cut or excess material removed or trimmed in order to fit it in certain areas. • Polycarbonate has high shock resistance and can dampen static electricity. Static electricity can pose major issues for semiconductors, so semiconductors made of polycarbonate can effectively negate the issue of static electricity. • Polycarbonate is slightly more expensive than other HDPE and polypropylene, but the added benefits and widespread applications make it worth the cost.

6. Conclusions • While these three are the primary plastics used for making semiconductors, some manufacturers may also use other plastic variants in lesser degree depending on highly customized product specifications. • But these three remain the top 3 most desired raw materials for making semiconductors, which make use of a combination of other materials to produce the final product. • All the materials used to make semiconductors are rigorously tested, for ay deviation from the required properties of materials can have adverse effects on the end product.