Lead based solder

[4square]

I have heard, not seen anything in print yet, that the sale/supply of lead based solder of any type is to cease within the next few years, due to EU ruling. Anyone else heard of this, any info. on it?

[Andy Dingley]

Well that's what you get for listening to UKIP scaremongering. They're going to straighten your bananas too you know !

Was it Europe that imposed Part P on us ? Or Blair ?

[Grumps]

Well, there is this (been out for quite q few years);

are exemptions.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Certainly for use on potable water supplies. Doubt it for electrical or general use. The fumes from the flux are said to be more of a risk. They can't be much of a risk or I'd be dead by now.

[Dave Stanton]

Yes, our company went lead free last year. All flow soldering and hand soldering inc my service side has gone that way. TAkes a while to get used to lead free solder I found.

Dave

[Adrian C]

Dave Plowman (News) wrote: > Certainly for use on potable water supplies. Doubt it for electrical or

I've got some lead-free solder for electronic assembly work. It's got a very nice sweet fragance which just invites more breathing in of the stuff. I'm still alive as i write this last wordl;wqdwqdfeq......

-- Adrian

[Lee]

of a risk. They

Some manufacturers ar switching to lead free solder - probably out of fear or hype that lead solder will eventually be banned. And I'd agree on the flux, it gives me asthma if I breathe it in too much.

Lee

[Ian White]

More than you ever want to know...

For a start, scroll down to "lead-free soldering", at:

basic aim is very praiseworthy: to drastically reduce the amount of lead going into landfill in the solder content of scrap electronic equipment. But lead-free solder requires much tighter process tolerances than the old tin/lead, and many industry commentators are expecting a decrease in reliability of electronic equipment.

Hand soldering and repairs are significantly more difficult with lead-free solder. Bit temperatures have to increase, and/or it takes significantly longer to heat up the joint, both of which increase the risk of overheating the components and PC boards.

In trying to avoid that risk, you may instead risk making 'cold' joints that will very quickly fail... but even good joints made with lead-free solder *look* like they are cold joints! Your experience in judging the quality of tin-lead solder joints by their appearance can actually mislead you with lead-free. That can lead you into a vicious circle of re-heating joints that actually may be perfectly OK... if only you could be sure.

For ordinary DIY hand soldering, stock up on all the leaded solder you're going to need for a lifetime, while it's still available. If you use it to repair existing equipment and extend its working life, then IMO you'll have done more than your share to keep lead out of landfill.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

But lead being a natural mineral surely occurs in some concentration anyway in some parts of the world? Or am I missing something?

[Steven Briggs]

In message ,

4square writes

Yes, its banned (there are some exemptions) from 1 July 2006 under the RoHS (restriction of Hazardous Substances) directive. Total ******* nightmare. Lead free solders require higher process temperatures and much better process control, and still the joints look crap. The real problem is contamination by lead. Even a fractional percentage of lead in the solder completely screws joint reliability. Therefore before you turn a product / process over to leadfree, you have to 100% sure ALL your components are leadfree. Some component manufactures have changed part numbers, some haven't. Everything has to be checked, inventories and databases updated etc etc. Now if you make loads of a small range of products, it manageable. We make small volumes of a huge range of complex products. Its a complete bureaucratic nonsense that will cripple UK / European electronics manufacture, and just drive more of it to China.

The real stupid thing is that the WEEE directive (Waste electrical / electronic equipment) means that in future most electrical stuff will be separated and recycled anyway, so all this lead was to be taken out of the landfill route anyway.

RoHS is my favourite anti-euro rant topic at the moment!

Plenty of info here :

[Ian Johnston]

: Yes, our company went lead free last year. All flow soldering and hand : soldering inc my service side has gone that way. TAkes a while to get used : to lead free solder I found.

I do a lot of soldering work with children. The first reel of lead free solder I got was dreadful - far too high a melting point. I got some from Maplins recently, though, as an experiment, which works fine.

Ian

[Ian White]

As far as lead in solder is concerned, those arguments are already over. The global electronics industry is changing to lead-free soldering, and that's unstoppable.

My point was that a forced and hurried change is not the right way to do it. Not if safety-critical systems become less reliable, failure rates in general increase... and by the way, more scrap electronics goes into landfill. Less lead, but even more junk.

[Andrew McKay]

You'll have the RSPCC onto you sharpish mate! ;)

Andrew

[Ian Johnston]

: Ian Johnston wrote: : > I do a lot of soldering work with children. : : You'll have the RSPCC onto you sharpish mate! ;)

"with", not "onto".

Ian

[Chris Bacon]

What's that done to the price of tin, then?

[Ian White]

You're getting the idea now...

[Chris Bacon]

well. It's now much nearer the price before the collapse of the International Tin Council in 1985.

[sylva]

I took a tour around a privately owned tin mine in Cornwall last year, the chap said it was just about economic to consider re working it rather than just giving tours.

AJH

[Chris Bacon]

Which was that, then, AJH? Geevor? I don't know what's on at South Crofty, which was the last mine... (AFAIR it got to around 500 fm deep, one shaft (New Cooks?) being 450 fm straight down!).

[sylva]

No this was an old disused mine which had been bought by one of the machine drivers working in the last commercial mines. He and his son had turned it into a rudimentary tourist attraction. The tour wasn't really in the mine but just a walk through the various processes in extraction and smelting. I bought my wife a celtic cross pendant they had cast there. I think it was the Wheal Kitty but the brochure said Blue Hills. It is on the coast north of St Agnes.

AJH