I had it forced on me at my day job. Partly due to the fact that we sold a lot of product to EU and other offshore customers. We retained some of our beloved 63/37 on the (valid) excuse that we serviced a 20 year old product line that was still in production and we needed both kinds of solder.
NASA has a web page devoted to this stuff which, among other things, hosts a paper that is a good send-up of the lead-free fiasco.
73
-Jim
NU0C
On Sat, 10 Feb 2024 12:28:41 -0800
"John Nightingale via groups.io" <if455kc@...> wrote:
> Further to Prawlin's post: aquestion for the q.c. engineers present.
> In the long long ago this writer, doing bench repairs of high end
transceivers for a big company, had imposed upon him the use of lead
free solder. That lead to bitter complaints until, a couple of months
later, the same "little man" who had confiscated our good old eutectic
solder had come around again with his cart and had taken back the lead
free solder and replaced that with rolls of the lead containing eutectic
solder that we knew so well. The arrogant V.P. of Q.C., who would not
listen, had been forced to climb down!
> Lead free solder had become "fashionable" in his professional circle
and he was going to thrust it upon us. He had probably never made a
quick, competent and shiny solder joint in his life; a degree is not
enough. Fortunately, some of the very senior engineers in the company,
one a ham of the old school, "had dirt under their finger nails" and
knew a good solder joint when they saw it.
> Now many of us on this list will know the nuisance lead free solder
was in earlier days. FromPrawlin's post it appears that the problems
have not all been resolved. The stuff might be alright for equipment
down at the consumer level. The question that arises is what high end
users specify today. What does the N.A.S.A. the European Space Agency
and any operation engaged in making man rated systems do to ensure
reliable joints? Should we ordinary mortals, soured by early experience,
be attempting to use lead free solder? Is it today as good as Kester 44
eutectic and similar?
> Those of us in the know about lead free solder in its early days
would not care to board a space vehicle or even a commercial aircraft
relying on what we knew at the time as lead free solder. The passengers
on the "Gimli Glider" and others involved learned about solder joints
that come apart.
> John,
> at radio station VE7AOV.
++++++++
On 2024-02-10 08:35, Prawlin via groups.io wrote:
Thanks Erik. Just sending pic again hopefully at better resolution. If
you zoom a little, you can clearly see the places where the connector
legs originally were. I had only used the connector a few times and
had not knowingly exerted any excessive forces. Some insertion force
is unavoidable with that particular Jack design. I wonder if gentle
twisting of the Jack plug whilst inserting might reduce the risk? Then
again, it might increase the chances of the blobs fracturing by
twisting forces? Maybe adding a tiny dab of contact lube or silicon
grease might allow easier Jack insertion/removal? I’ve considered
carefully adding a tiny amount of thin cyano to bond the connector to
the PCB. It is unlikely to ever need replacing in the future (though I
can hear some groaning now as I write this)
I still blame the lead free solder. I’m retired now but in my career
we lived through the introduction of lead free and it caused no end of
similar joint fracture problems.
I’m glad the same didn’t happen with the USB C as that would likely
result in hard to fix or even unrepairable PCB (delaminating of those
tiny close pitch pins)!
IMG_4115
On 10 Feb 2024, at 15:05, Erik Kaashoek <erik@...> wrote:
?/g/tinysa/message/9042
--
Designer of the tinySA
For more info go to
--
73
-Jim
NU0C
Jim Shorney