This is an optical image of the capacitor showing the part number.
This is the section after final polish. Note the lack of a solder fillet between the right side termination and the lead.
This is a BSE SEM image of the section. These anomalies are parallel in the plane of the capacitor plates (i.e. knit line defects) raising a question about the “as-sintered” strength of the structure.
This fracture shows characteristics of thermal shock damage, possibly during attachment of the device leads to the capacitor end caps.
This fracture traverses capacitor plates of opposite polarity, which typically results in a shorted capacitor. The fracture appears to propagate from a knit line defect suggesting the root cause is related to the original firing of the multilayer ceramic element.
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