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TPIC1021: defect TPIC1021 chips counterfeit

Part Number: TPIC1021

We have during the past 10 years over 60000 devices with a TPIC1021 in use, and had never received a RMA with a defect TPIC1021 chip.

From a last production batch  ca 2000 units are  in use at one site, Till now we have already received over 40 devices with a defect TPIC1021.

The designs  are CE tested and had no issues during immunity testing. They all should have had a functional test at the factory.

We try to investigate what the problem could be. Is it something special on this site or something with  this batch of TPIC1021 chips.

As far as we know there is now high-power equipment on this site, only conveyor belts and packing machines.

question:

What kind of equipment would be needed to generate emissions above what is tested within  the ce specification.that could destroy the TPIC1021 chip. The distance to other equipment is more than 15 meter.

Are you aware of problems with some batches of  TPIC1021 chips?

Are there second sources or counterfeit TPIC1021 chips on the market?

  • Hi Ben,

    I want to make sure I understand the situation - are the following statements correct?

    1. The design itself has been tested for CE immunity and no issues were observed.  This testing does not apply to each unit shipped, but each unit would go through a functional test at production.

    2. The 40 defective units would have passed the production testing, but a system-level failure was identified during usage in the field and tied to the TPIC1021 component.

    Assuming that understanding is correct, can you verify whether or not the production test would have caught this specific issue (i.e., does it have suitable coverage)?  That way we can at least know whether the issue appeared while the devices were operating in the field (and could potentially be tied to some kind of overstress) or whether they could have been initially defective (in which case we would want to look closer through the supply chain).

    On our side we aren't aware of any quality issues related to this device, and any units shipped by TI would have passed our production testing.  If you do suspect counterfeit devices, though, you can follow the instructions in this thread:

    https://e2e.ti.com/support/power-management/f/196/p/796593/2947137

    Can you share any further info about the nature of the defect?  E.g., does it affect only TX or RX functionality, is there an obvious pin short, etc.?

    Regards,
    Max

  • Thank you for the quick reply.

    We have a bigger problem with our manufacturer. We could verify by reading out the eeprom that the devices did not pas production test but where shipped any way. The tpic1021 chips where very likely already defect at production. We had more defect device during the pas half year but they where handled as normal RMA.

    Unfortunately  the defect devices are already send back to the manufacturer so we can not test the functionality of the tpic1021 chip at the moment.

    We compared the logo's from the chips on our prototypes (ordered from Farnell) with the ones from our manufacturer. And they look different. The TI logo looks  laser engraved, but the chips from the manufacture look more like printed and the text can also be scrapped of. So we suspect counterfeit chips.

    We are asked the manufacturer to send us documentation about where they did order the chips but are still waiting for answer.

    I attached some pictures the ones named Farnell we assume are real Ti chips. Could you just give us you opinion from these photostpic1021.zip

  • Hi Ben,

    This part is assembled at a couple of different locations, so some variation in the top-side marking methodology is expected.  We checked into the lot trace codes pictured here, though, and didn't seem to find valid records for the codes listed in the "man2" or "man4" images.  Hopefully your manufacturer can help you better track down the source of these, since at first glance it does look suspicious.  All of the other images did at least map to recorded lots of either our TPIC1021 or TPIC1021A part numbers.

    Regards,
    Max