L suffix mean in Onsemi

Semiconductor Discrete Semiconductor Products
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  1. what does L suffix indicate in the part- BZX84C8V2LT1G. (Onsemi)
  2. what is the difference between BZX84C8V2L and BZX84C8V2. (Onsemi)

Kind Regards,
Bharath Dhage

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Hi bharath.dhage,

TL;DR: The “L” suffix is a legacy Motorola reference to a slightly lower profile version of the SOT-23 package back when some were made taller than others. The “L” suffix has just stuck with the onsemi part numbers for historical reasons and has no special meaning any longer.

The onsemi part number BZX84C8V2 is an obsolete part from the Fairchild line of onsemi products.

To explain further, a short history lesson:

In 1999, the “Standard Products” division of Motorola was spun out into a stand-alone company and named “ON Semiconductor”. It’s name was later changed to “onsemi”. In 2016, On Semiconductor acquired Fairchild Semiconductor.

At that time, both companies manufactured the industry-standard part number “BZX84” series of zener diodes. So, for some time, onsemi produced and sold 2 different versions of the BZX84 series, each following their own standard of part numbering, with the Motorola line using the “L” suffix while the Fairchild line did not. This explains why some had the “L” suffix while others did not.

I could not find an old Motorola branded version of the BZX84 datasheet, but I could find a datasheet for a few Motorola part numbers (MBAS16, MMBD914x, etc.) of high-speed switching diodes in the same SOT-23 (a.k.a. TO-236) package.

In this document, it explains that one could order those parts with or without the “L” suffix, and it shows in the package diagrams that the “L” suffix means that it has a “Low Profile Lead Form” with the package name of “TO-236AB” vs. their non-“L” suffix parts with the package name of “TO-236AA”. onsemi eventually obsoleted the Fairchild variant and kept producing their own Motorola variant. Thus, all of their actively produced parts include the “L” in the suffix, representing the “Low Profile” TO-236AB variant.

Here’s some images of an old Motorola datasheet showing the meaning of the “L” suffix:

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From what I can tell, pretty much all vendors now seem to only use the low-profile TO-236AB package variant of the SOT-23, so many, including onsemi, seem to have eliminated any reference to the “AA” or “AB” variants of the TO-236 package in their current datasheets and just call it a TO-236, with no suffix. However, for historical reasons, their part numbers, such as the BZX84C8V2LT1G, continue to have the “L” within their part numbers.

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Impressive!

That took some time @David_1528.

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@David_1528 , Thank you for the information you provided. It has been most helpful. It was highly informative and I recognise the effort you put in to.