Abstract
Insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBT) have been utilized in high power and fast switching applications for power management. Research on transient thermal performance assessment has become imperative because of the excessive heat generated from the IGBT chip. In this study, the transient thermal performance of the power chip under the power cycling test was investigated, and the temperature history on the chip was recorded by an infrared thermometer during the test. The test conditions of the experiment were based on: the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) standard. The current density distribution of the IGBT chip was investigated by electro-thermal finite element (FE) analysis. In order to validate the methodology for FE analysis, the predicted temperature distribution was compared with the experimental data under the same electrical load. Furthermore, the temperature-dependent material property was employed in electro-thermal FE analysis. The results show that the current crowding effect occurred near the periphery of the bonding wires. Moreover, the solder under the chip provided a significant route of heat dissipation in the power chip, when high power was applied. ©2010 IEEE.