Is this over kill on cleaning?

[saxmonster]

Scroll down to the bottom and you will see him cleaning the pcb with soap and water then alcohol.  I heard of using alcohol and a toothbrush but soap and water.  What are you thoughts?

-Scott

Here is the link

http://www.evolutionarytheory.com/2011/07/sb4000-bus-compressor-build-day-2/

 

[JohnRoberts]

IIRC organic fluxes were water soluble, and nasty if not cleaned completely off... I haven't seen or used organic flux since the '70s.

JR

 

[gar381]

Check these guys out..

http://www.odellstations.com/

These guys cleaned a quart of beer out of a Soundcraft Desk for my sound company.
It came back working better then NEW..  pots , faders, shadow switches and all.

Their process uses soap and water and a drying oven.  The soap is
a lot like floor soap.  This process was designed to clean Military
Avionics.

GARY

 

[Ptownkid]

I ALWAYS clean boards after soldering with flux remover and then alcohol. Regarding the washing of the board in the manner that Etheory did it, I'm pretty sure that the designer of the project he was building put it in the instructions...

Cheers

 

[Kingston]

The result seems to speak for itself.

 

[okgb]

Of course cleaning before soldering is a good idea , Allot of products are water based ,
even some acid core solders and can be cleaned with warm water by itself ,
Pick any maxim that fits , it all falls into attention to detail

 

[JohnRoberts]

It can depend on the components. I recall issues back in the day from water cleaning and high pressure air hose to dry off the boards. I had some polystyrene caps damaged by water being blown inside them. (My old business partner liked his high pressure air hose a little too much :-( .).

Most modern components are immune to water, but it is a good idea to not leave any conductive residue behind.

JR

 

[Andy Peters]

Scroll down to the bottom and you will see him cleaning the pcb with soap and water then alcohol.  I heard of using alcohol and a toothbrush but soap and water.  What are you thoughts?

-Scott

Here is the link

http://www.evolutionarytheory.com/2011/07/sb4000-bus-compressor-build-day-2/

At the day job, all assembled and reworked PCBs (all lead-free/RoHS, too) are cleaned with a solution of something called "Detergent 8," which is a low-foaming phosphate-free detergent designed to clean electronic assemblies and remove flux and other grime. A little bit goes a long way. After cleaning, the boards are rinsed with deionized water. The DI water is used so those awful white spots don't appear on your boards and blown dry with low-ish pressure shop air.

Obviously stuff that can't be cleaned in this manner isn't, but then again, we haven't put a pot or an unsealed switch on a board in ages.

The main benefit of this cleaner over, say, Dawn dishwashing detergent is that it's low foaming and a lot easier to rinse off. This kind of cleaning is important when the PCBA is installed in a vacuum chamber that houses a sensor that's cooled to -100 degrees C.

FWIW, I've never been very successful at cleaning a board with alcohol. An actual detergent works a lot better.

-a

 

[buildafriend]

A quick spray with 99 percent alchy usually does the trick for me. I once watched my sb4000 go underwater. I saw bubbles flow out of it. I was in a fright elevator and when it hit the basement floor the basement was flooded. It still works fine. I gave it a few days after a good shake and blow dryer treatment. At first I thought I had watched 500 bucks and 4 days work go to waste.

 

[mulletchuck]

lol why'd it take you 4 days to build that box?  it's like a 10-hour build!

 

[buildafriend]

I was much more of a newb at the time