Metal electrode leadless face

Because of their cylindrical shape and small size, these components can roll off the workbench or circuit board before they have been soldered into place.

[3] During automated SMT pick-and-place, this happens mostly if the mechanical pressure of the SMD placer nozzle is too low.

To overcome some of the difficulties encountered when mounting these devices, there are also variants with square electrodes (e.g. SQ MELF, QuadroMELF and B-MELF).

These variants are mainly used in semiconductor diodes for applications where the high reliability of hermetically sealed voidless-glass packages is required.

[3][5] Despite their handling difficulties, and in the particular case of MELF resistors, they are still widely used in high-reliability and precision applications where their predictable characteristics (e.g., low failure rate with well-defined failure modes) as well as their higher performance in terms of accuracy, long-term stability, moisture resistance, high-temperature operation far outweigh their disadvantages.