Fun with Lead-Free soldering

[Chris Carlen]

Hi:

I got a roll of Kester SAC305 alloy 0.031" no-clean flux cored wire
solder. Tested it out by soldering a DIP and some wires to a PCB and
also by tinning some wire. The tinning went a lot smoother (wetted
slightly under the skin, not just the tip near the iron) when some
additional rosin flux liquid was applied. Without that, such as with
the PCB, the solder definitely doesn't wet and flow like SnPb. It
works, but doesn't give a very satisfying "feel." And is also harder to
control how much to feed into a joint, since you don't know if it is in
the mood to soak through or not on any particular attempt. Ultimately
if I had to, I could get the hang of it.

I am curious to see what will come down the pike at my job, where it is
likely that soon we will be banned from soldering (actually using any
chemicals) in our work areas.

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists. But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

The next question is whether there will eventually be a push toward
eliminating Pb based solders in the soldering that we have to do.

I spent some time at aimsolder.com today, looking at their CASTIN alloy,
which contains a little bit of antimony. Says it wets better than
SAC305 and higher Ag containing alloys. Apparently <=2.5% Ag is better
for wetting. I hope that alloy works a little easier.

Which leads to my question of the day:

If the automated assembly industry will definitely move to lead-free,
what about all the hand soldering that is still done? It seems it is
easier to get automated processes to work well with these solders, but
hand soldering will just never be the same. Is the EU banning only
commercial products from Pb solder processes, or will lead solder be
simply unavailable, such as to hobbyists and engineers doing R&D work?



Good day!

 

[Jim Yanik]

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating,

YUK! Proper anti-static and QC procedures must not exist in your shop.

 

[Pooh Bear]

Hi:

I got a roll of Kester SAC305 alloy 0.031" no-clean flux cored wire
solder. Tested it out by soldering a DIP and some wires to a PCB and
also by tinning some wire. The tinning went a lot smoother (wetted
slightly under the skin, not just the tip near the iron) when some
additional rosin flux liquid was applied. Without that, such as with
the PCB, the solder definitely doesn't wet and flow like SnPb. It
works, but doesn't give a very satisfying "feel." And is also harder to
control how much to feed into a joint, since you don't know if it is in
the mood to soak through or not on any particular attempt. Ultimately
if I had to, I could get the hang of it.

I am curious to see what will come down the pike at my job, where it is
likely that soon we will be banned from soldering (actually using any
chemicals) in our work areas.

So they'll just throw away anything not working ?

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists. But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

The next question is whether there will eventually be a push toward
eliminating Pb based solders in the soldering that we have to do.

I spent some time at aimsolder.com today, looking at their CASTIN alloy,
which contains a little bit of antimony. Says it wets better than
SAC305 and higher Ag containing alloys. Apparently <=2.5% Ag is better
for wetting. I hope that alloy works a little easier.

Which leads to my question of the day:

If the automated assembly industry will definitely move to lead-free,
what about all the hand soldering that is still done? It seems it is
easier to get automated processes to work well with these solders, but
hand soldering will just never be the same. Is the EU banning only
commercial products from Pb solder processes, or will lead solder be
simply unavailable, such as to hobbyists and engineers doing R&D work?

For starters, solder with lead will continue to be available for maintenance
reasons as I understand things.

Several industry sectors ( telecoms, servers and networking gear ) have
negotiated an 'opt-out' and will continue to use solder containing lead. I
believe this is since they made a case that their equipment can't be made
reliably with lead free soldering methods.

Stand by for more exceptions when the shit fits the fan.

The whole thing is a bureaucratic balls-up.

Graham

 

[Barry Lennox]

Hi:


snip


If the automated assembly industry will definitely move to lead-free,
what about all the hand soldering that is still done? It seems it is
easier to get automated processes to work well with these solders, but
hand soldering will just never be the same. Is the EU banning only
commercial products from Pb solder processes, or will lead solder be
simply unavailable, such as to hobbyists and engineers doing R&D work?

I have,over the past couple of years, tried nearly all the
alternatives to lead-free solder, and not one of them come near the
flowing and wetability of good old 63:37. IIRC, a bismuth based one
was about the best of a bad pack.

The EU directives only apply to those things "Put on the market"
(Euro-bollocks-speak for "sold") Hobbyist, experimental, and DIY
users are unaffected. It's a funny directive, if you are not covered
specifically by it, you are exempt. Then, there are general exemptions
for military, national security, national telecom infrastructure, and
IIRC, medical implants. ie, anything that's damn important has been
exempted by the Euro-fools, too scared of anything going wrong. Then
article 5(1)(b) allows for an application for exemption to be made,
and a number of these are in the pipeline. The rumor has that the TAC
(Tech advisory Committee, those that do the directive's bidding) are
going to be pretty hard-nosed on these.

The latest bit of Euro-stupidity is them having a talk-fest about the
amount of lead permitted in chandeliers. So when was the last time you
saw of those being tossed into a land-fill ??? My nephew spent about 2
years looking for one for a historic home, and then he got gouged on
the price. Silly boy, he should have just got one free from the Euro-
landfills that are obviously brimming with old chandeliers

Barry Lennox

 

[Joerg]

Hello Chris,

I am curious to see what will come down the pike at my job, where it is
likely that soon we will be banned from soldering (actually using any
chemicals) in our work areas.

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists. But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

Eating at the lab desk? That sure doesn't sound like a proper work place
procedure. I mostly work in medical electronics. If the FDA ever saw
someone have a burger at a work station I bet they'd lock down the whole
company. Actually I am pretty sure they would, and for good reasons.

Even here in my consulting practice there is strictly no eating in
office or lab areas. Never.

Other than that, what about the chemicals in the ketchup on a burger?

Regards, Joerg

 

[Ken Smith]

Hi:

I got a roll of Kester SAC305 alloy 0.031" no-clean flux cored wire
solder.

*NO CLEAN* Gag-gag-gag. Throw it away. I've seen too many problems
caused by "noclean" flux. Get some good water clean flux stuff.

Tested it out by soldering a DIP and some wires to a PCB and
also by tinning some wire. The tinning went a lot smoother (wetted
slightly under the skin, not just the tip near the iron) when some
additional rosin flux liquid was applied.

That's one of the problems with the "no clean" stuff. It isn't very good
flux.

[...]

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists.

My office is my lab. I eat in the lunch room.

(My emulator has to be hooked to the proto type and to a PC. This either
means I need two PCs or have the lab in the office. They knocked out a
wall to make the space large enough.)

But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

If chemicals are needed to clean a PCB, I take the PCB to the fume hooded
PCB cleaning area. I don't bring those chemicals into the office/lab.

[...]

If the automated assembly industry will definitely move to lead-free,
what about all the hand soldering that is still done? It seems it is
easier to get automated processes to work well with these solders, but
hand soldering will just never be the same. Is the EU banning only
commercial products from Pb solder processes, or will lead solder be
simply unavailable, such as to hobbyists and engineers doing R&D work?

I think a more expensive solder for hand work will become available.
Chances are it will be an alloy of plutonium, goofium and unsidaisium and
hence be as toxic as all get out but it will be lead free.

 

[Joerg]

Hello Ken,

I think a more expensive solder for hand work will become available.
Chances are it will be an alloy of plutonium, goofium and unsidaisium and
hence be as toxic as all get out but it will be lead free.

Like driving the devil out with Beelzebub. This all reminds me of MTBE
that they hastily used to oxygenate California gas to make cleaner air.
It drops a car's fuel efficiency by about 10%. What an achievement. Then
they found out it pollutes the ground water. Big time. But it was kind
of too late.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Pooh Bear]

I think a more expensive solder for hand work will become available.
Chances are it will be an alloy of plutonium, goofium and unsidaisium and
hence be as toxic as all get out but it will be lead free.

You forgot the Unobtainium ! ;-)

Graham

 

[Pooh Bear]

Hello Ken,


Like driving the devil out with Beelzebub. This all reminds me of MTBE
that they hastily used to oxygenate California gas to make cleaner air.
It drops a car's fuel efficiency by about 10%. What an achievement. Then
they found out it pollutes the ground water. Big time. But it was kind
of too late.

Hi Joerg, I've heard in passing of this MTBE but never understood what it was
all about. Care to eleborate ?

Incidentally, I reckon that bio-fuel is the long term answer to oil shortage /
demand / price issues, not to mention reducing greenhouse gases. I gather that
there are a number of pilot schemes that are actually fairly big now that are
showing interesting results. Ford is selling a version of its Focus in Sweden
for example that'll run an a 50/50 mix of straight petroleum fuel and alcohol.
The alcohol is made by 'brewing' timber waste. For some reason I don't yet
understand, unlike Brazil's gasohol, this mix actually provides 10% *more*
power than straight unleaded ! Sounds great to me. The hydrogen fuel idea is
plain bonkers in comparison.

Graham

 

[Fred Abse]

Like driving the devil out with Beelzebub. This all reminds me of MTBE
that they hastily used to oxygenate California gas to make cleaner air.
It drops a car's fuel efficiency by about 10%. What an achievement. Then
they found out it pollutes the ground water. Big time. But it was kind
of too late.

I read somewhere that is either is now, or soon will be, economic to sweep
the dust off the freeways and recover the platinum out of the catalytic
converters from it.

Probably urban myth.

 

[Spehro Pefhany]

I read somewhere that is either is now, or soon will be, economic to sweep
the dust off the freeways and recover the platinum out of the catalytic
converters from it.

Probably urban myth.

Yes, it's a catalyst (natch), so it doesn't get used up. The housing
rots and the platinum/rhodium thin film is still there.


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

 

[Jeff]

I read somewhere that is either is now, or soon will be, economic to sweep
the dust off the freeways and recover the platinum out of the catalytic
converters from it.

Probably urban myth.

I say urban myth,

Especially since the ceramic beads or ceramic honeycomb that is used in
catalytic converters, have a coating of catalyst which is only a few micro
inches thick at best. This may amount to a few square feet at a few micro
inches thick of platinum in a large converter. Converting to metric, gives a
block of platinum about 1 cm by 1 cm by 0.3 mm, or about 0.03 CC's, which is
about 0.64g worth. Not much, especially considering that very little is
likely to leave the converter. A replacement catalytic converter costs
around $150 CND for a typical unit, proving there can't be much precious
metals in side.

 

[Jeff]

Hi:

I got a roll of Kester SAC305 alloy 0.031" no-clean flux cored wire
solder.

*NO CLEAN* Gag-gag-gag. Throw it away. I've seen too many problems
caused by "noclean" flux. Get some good water clean flux stuff.

Tested it out by soldering a DIP and some wires to a PCB and
also by tinning some wire. The tinning went a lot smoother (wetted
slightly under the skin, not just the tip near the iron) when some
additional rosin flux liquid was applied.

That's one of the problems with the "no clean" stuff. It isn't very good
flux.

[...]

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists.

My office is my lab. I eat in the lunch room.

(My emulator has to be hooked to the proto type and to a PC. This either
means I need two PCs or have the lab in the office. They knocked out a
wall to make the space large enough.)

But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

If chemicals are needed to clean a PCB, I take the PCB to the fume hooded
PCB cleaning area. I don't bring those chemicals into the office/lab.

[...]

If the automated assembly industry will definitely move to lead-free,
what about all the hand soldering that is still done? It seems it is
easier to get automated processes to work well with these solders, but
hand soldering will just never be the same. Is the EU banning only
commercial products from Pb solder processes, or will lead solder be
simply unavailable, such as to hobbyists and engineers doing R&D work?

I think a more expensive solder for hand work will become available.
Chances are it will be an alloy of plutonium, goofium and unsidaisium and
hence be as toxic as all get out but it will be lead free.

I had a spec sheet on my desk for some lead free. It was bragging about a
lower then most other lead free solder melting temps, and I think reasonable
wetting. I was wondering what they used to lower the melting point, since
the usual alternatives are ether expensive (indium), or much more toxic then
lead. Reading the spec sheet it was alloyed with a little cadmium.

 

[Joerg]

Hello Graham,

Hi Joerg, I've heard in passing of this MTBE but never understood what it was
all about. Care to eleborate ?

I am not a chemist. All I know is that it increases oxygen in fuel and
raises the octane level. It supposedly burns cleaner. Even though I have
a car that adjusts the combustion process to the fuel quality in
realtime I can see a notable drop in fuel efficiency between in-state
and out-of-state gas. About 10% or so. Also, this boutique gas is a lot
more expensive than gas anywhere else.

MTBE has the unwanted side effect that if gas leaks from old storage
tanks it pollutes the ground water. So the politicians who had hastily
mandated the stuff then hastily mandated that all gas stations change
their tanks to double-walled. Of course, much of that was water under
the bridge by that time.

Incidentally, I reckon that bio-fuel is the long term answer to oil shortage /
demand / price issues, not to mention reducing greenhouse gases. I gather that
there are a number of pilot schemes that are actually fairly big now that are
showing interesting results. Ford is selling a version of its Focus in Sweden
for example that'll run an a 50/50 mix of straight petroleum fuel and alcohol.
The alcohol is made by 'brewing' timber waste. For some reason I don't yet
understand, unlike Brazil's gasohol, this mix actually provides 10% *more*
power than straight unleaded ! Sounds great to me. ...

Yes, but unfortunately all those efforts take place outside the US.
There isn't much here. I have seen bio diesel engines operate in the
80's. Not here but in Europe. In those days you still had to start them
with regular diesel. It was amazing, there was a faint soot in the
exhaust on diesel and when they switched over it became completely clear.

Running on timber? People had figured that out during and after WW II
already. Huge barrels were strapped to cars to make "wood carburetors"
because there just wasn't any other fuel available.

... The hydrogen fuel idea is plain bonkers in comparison.

AFAIK you need natural gas to make it on a large scale. Looking at the
rapidly rising natural gas prices over here that hydrogen strategy
doesn't make much sense to me.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Jim Thompson]

Hello Graham,


I am not a chemist. All I know is that it increases oxygen in fuel and
raises the octane level. It supposedly burns cleaner. Even though I have
a car that adjusts the combustion process to the fuel quality in
realtime I can see a notable drop in fuel efficiency between in-state
and out-of-state gas. About 10% or so. Also, this boutique gas is a lot
more expensive than gas anywhere else.

MTBE has the unwanted side effect that if gas leaks from old storage
tanks it pollutes the ground water. So the politicians who had hastily
mandated the stuff then hastily mandated that all gas stations change
their tanks to double-walled. Of course, much of that was water under
the bridge by that time.

[snip]

MTBE is now recognized as bad-assed stuff, bad for the environment and
doubly bad for humans... it's going to be phased out in Arizona, IIRC,
beginning this winter.

...Jim Thompson

 

[Joerg]

Hello Jim,

MTBE is now recognized as bad-assed stuff, bad for the environment and
doubly bad for humans... it's going to be phased out in Arizona, IIRC,
beginning this winter.

Here in CA they are replacing it with Ethanol. Which means we will still
have boutique gas at elevated prices.

I don't think politicians will ever understand that you have to have a
reliable fast train system to drag people away from their cars. I'd use
the train to the Bay Area but not right now where you never know when it
really arrives. And that thing crawls like a snail compared to the
trains overseas. So, everybody hops into their cars or a rental to do
the 2-3 hour trip.

Regards, Joerg

 

[Richard Henry]

Hello Graham,


I am not a chemist. All I know is that it increases oxygen in fuel and
raises the octane level. It supposedly burns cleaner. Even though I have
a car that adjusts the combustion process to the fuel quality in
realtime I can see a notable drop in fuel efficiency between in-state
and out-of-state gas. About 10% or so. Also, this boutique gas is a lot
more expensive than gas anywhere else.

MTBE has the unwanted side effect that if gas leaks from old storage
tanks it pollutes the ground water. So the politicians who had hastily
mandated the stuff then hastily mandated that all gas stations change
their tanks to double-walled. Of course, much of that was water under
the bridge by that time.

MTBE was the cheap alternative to using ethanol. The ethanol producers (or
at least the corn producers) were the source of the lobbying funds to get
the superoxygenated gasoline mix legislation passed. The west coast
refiners squawked at the impending cost increase, so MTBE (which can be made
in the refinery) was the compromise.

Presumably, if the gorund water were polluted with ethanol, fewer people
would be complaining.

 

[Zak]

Presumably, if the gorund water were polluted with ethanol, fewer people
would be complaining.

Benzene etc in ground water is not good either, but it isn't as mobile
as MTBE.

The problem with MTBR seems not that it is so toxic, but that it has a
very strong taste.


Thomas

 

[Pooh Bear]

Hi:

I got a roll of Kester SAC305 alloy 0.031" no-clean flux cored wire
solder.

*NO CLEAN* Gag-gag-gag. Throw it away. I've seen too many problems
caused by "noclean" flux. Get some good water clean flux stuff.

Tested it out by soldering a DIP and some wires to a PCB and
also by tinning some wire. The tinning went a lot smoother (wetted
slightly under the skin, not just the tip near the iron) when some
additional rosin flux liquid was applied.

That's one of the problems with the "no clean" stuff. It isn't very good
flux.

[...]

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists.

My office is my lab. I eat in the lunch room.

(My emulator has to be hooked to the proto type and to a PC. This either
means I need two PCs or have the lab in the office. They knocked out a
wall to make the space large enough.)

But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

If chemicals are needed to clean a PCB, I take the PCB to the fume hooded
PCB cleaning area. I don't bring those chemicals into the office/lab.

[...]

If the automated assembly industry will definitely move to lead-free,
what about all the hand soldering that is still done? It seems it is
easier to get automated processes to work well with these solders, but
hand soldering will just never be the same. Is the EU banning only
commercial products from Pb solder processes, or will lead solder be
simply unavailable, such as to hobbyists and engineers doing R&D work?

I think a more expensive solder for hand work will become available.
Chances are it will be an alloy of plutonium, goofium and unsidaisium and
hence be as toxic as all get out but it will be lead free.

I had a spec sheet on my desk for some lead free. It was bragging about a
lower then most other lead free solder melting temps, and I think reasonable
wetting. I was wondering what they used to lower the melting point, since
the usual alternatives are ether expensive (indium), or much more toxic then
lead. Reading the spec sheet it was alloyed with a little cadmium.

Well RoHS says you can't use that either !

Next .... ?

Graham

 

[przemek klosowski]

The point is that technician work areas are also used for eating, as we
don't have separate offices and labs like scientists. But if we can't
work with chemicals in our work areas, that sure cuts down on the amount
of work we can do.

The next question is whether there will eventually be a push toward
eliminating Pb based solders in the soldering that we have to do.

I spent some time at aimsolder.com today, looking at their CASTIN alloy,
which contains a little bit of antimony. Says it wets better than SAC305

Talk about jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. One of the
explanations of the name for Antimony is 'anti-monk'---because it killed
monks who worked with it. Lead is positively benign compared to Sb.