Lead free solder - first impressions

GroupDIY Audio Forum

Help Support GroupDIY Audio Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Rob Flinn

Well-known member
Joined
Jun 3, 2004
Messages
5,207
Location
Between Sussex, UK & Aude, France.
I`ve just had my first experience trying to use lead free solder.

Basically it is not that easy to get good connections with it compared with it's leaded predesessor.

I have to say I can see myself stocking up with some 60:40.
 
Hah hah,

Yeah somehow I can't really imagine solder without lead... RoHS is a bitch...

As long as you export your products to countries like Africa you still good to go for a few years...

I see myself sending ''Black Market' lead solder to the European DIY'ers... but if anyone asks.... you know nothing :green:

Matt
 
[quote author="rodabod"][Ebay]

Vintage Solder 60/40, Not N*eve, S*SL, A*KG, N*eumann[/quote]

LOL

I think lead free solder is pretty good. It ain't so different from leaded.
 
i accidently bought lead-free when i started my green pres. at first i thought it was ok with the temp turned up a little, but then it got my soldering iron tip all gunky and i had to switch back to leaded. :?
 
I have had the same spool of lead free stuff sitting here for a few years now - totally unusable stuff. Plus, I can never tell what is a bad joint or not cause its always dull when it cools.
 
We did a first run of Pb free wave soldering and it looked like crap. The circuit works, but still, it takes a while to get used to not seeing those brilliant clean connections.
Touch up is more of a pain also.
What are ya gonna do?
We are losing a part a day over to the lead free catalog.
Gives purchasing something to do I guess.
Buy a pound of the good stuff just in case.
 
I accidently bought lead-free when i started my green pres. at first i thought it was ok with the temp turned up a little, but then it got my soldering iron tip all gunky and i had to switch back to leaded.

That is precisley what happened. The melting point of this particular solder is supposed to be 217 degrees. I was at a place I do a bit of part time work at, where they had just bought 10 brand new temp controlled irons. It appears that the solder needs more heat than quoted, & then it ruined the tips on about 3 or 4 of the irons. The tips when a dark brown oxidized colour & from then on the solder just formed beads that fell off the iron. I can't be entirely sure this was the solder, but it appeared to be it.
 
What a bunch of whiners.

:grin:

I did my first projects with radio shack lead free, and it worked great. It may have eaten the tip off my iron... but otherwise... :?

It's all what you're used to. You can do just fine with the lead free. It looks different, it melts different, so you will have to relearn your cues about what the solder is doing and how it is behaving, and how to make it work best, etc. And you may have to clean the iron regularly...
:grin:
 
You have to use a different soldering tip when working with lead free solder.
And also make sure you buy leadfree solder og the sn/ag/cu type,
this will work pretty well and have a much lower melting point than ather types of leadfree solder.
And it can also be used for repair in equipment with lead solder.
 
Lead free solder in *our* business is a cruel hoax that means decreased reliabilty, at least in the short term until we figure out all of the glitches.

Major manufacturers are already fighting problems. Google for "tin whiskers" and then follow other threads from that.

I guess when aircrafts and space crafts begin falling from the skies due to crappy lead-free connections everyone will wake up to the fact that a well-perfected method of soldering has been replaced by a defective substitute.

In the meantime, the MAJOR users of lead in electronics (CRTs and batteries) have been exempted from the Euro RoHS directive.

Gee..what puts more lead into a landfill?? An old Ampex or UREI, or a 36" CRT or a car battery?

Oh...I also guess no one throws Ampex or UREI gear into the landfill....

Bri
 
[quote author="Repairman"]You have to use a different soldering tip when working with lead free solder.
And also make sure you buy leadfree solder og the sn/ag/cu type,
this will work pretty well and have a much lower melting point than ather types of leadfree solder.
And it can also be used for repair in equipment with lead solder.[/quote]

Good to know. A friend of mine was mistakenly sold some lead free solder, so I had to try it out. It definitely had a higher melting point and I wasn't quite able to make the fillets I wanted. I'll have to further look into using a different tip.

RoHS compliant (lead free, etc.) parts have been a huge issue at my workplace the last 6 months or so. We are finding that many of the lead free electrolytic caps don't have the temperature range needed to handle the lead free wave soldering process at the board house without getting damaged, or having their reliability reduced. It's a bit of a pickle.

Matt
 
[quote author="jcharles00"]i accidently bought lead-free when i started my green pres. at first i thought it was ok with the temp turned up a little, but then it got my soldering iron tip all gunky and i had to switch back to leaded. :?[/quote]

Oh, hey, dude. Must of missed your post. :grin:
 
[quote author="Rob Flinn"]
That is precisley what happened. The melting point of this particular solder is supposed to be 217 degrees. I was at a place I do a bit of part time work at, where they had just bought 10 brand new temp controlled irons. It appears that the solder needs more heat than quoted, & then it ruined the tips on about 3 or 4 of the irons. The tips when a dark brown oxidized colour & from then on the solder just formed beads that fell off the iron. I can't be entirely sure this was the solder, but it appeared to be it.[/quote]

i should note that after i got fed up with the "unleaded", i cleaned the tip up by re-tinning it with good silver solder and it appears to have gone back to normal.



[quote author="mateo"]
Oh, hey, dude. Must of missed your post.
[/quote]

hehe. i guess i need to put an avatar up to get noticed
 
lead free makes it harder to distinguish cold solder joints.
they all look cold!
for me, the guy who has to fix pc boards, that is the biggest pain.
 
I bought some lead free stuff in a pinch. It sucked. Fell right off the iron just like has been discuss previously. I need to go buy a huge spool of the good stuff and never think about it again.

Matt
 
I"m gonna try this again.

Is 60/40 no longer available??? Is there some new law I'm unaware of??

Do I need to stock up on 60/40 now???

Anybody???
 

Latest posts

Back
Top