Abstract
The purpose of this article is to focus on the electroless copper plating step from tartarate or ethylenediaminetetraacetic (EDTA) baths used in through hole plating (THP) of printed circuit boards (PCBs). The effect of bath operating conditions (temperature, pH and agitation) and bath additives (pyridine, cytosine, thiourea, benzotriazole (BT) and 2-mercaptobenzothiozole (2MBT)) on plating rate, bath stability, morphology and etching rate of the coating has been studied. It has been found that all the organic additives studied except thiourea not only stabilize electroless copper baths but also enhance the plating rate from 1.1 to 1.8 mg/(cm 2 h) in the tartarate bath at 30 °C and from 5.4 to 10.5 mg/(cm 2 h) in the EDTA bath at 50 °C. Mild air agitation increases the bath stability 20 times that of bath without aeration. The additives were found to modify the crystal structure with the production of small grain size, dense, tightly adherent and etching resistant copper deposit.
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