Hacker News Reader

Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

Unless you're dealing with electronics made prior to 2006, almost all of what you'll be soldering with is lead-free. Thank the EU's RoHS directive for that.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restriction_of_Hazardous_Subst...

View on HN

There's a lot of argument that lead-free solder isn't as good (or easy to use) and several hobbyists still use leaded solder.

Have you ever tried the lead free stuff as compared to a good 60/40 or something like that?

It's horrid to use. And the lead-free stuff is far worse in manufactured equipment - how many devices have failed early due to BGA solder joint failures that basically didn't exist before RoHS requirements? I think the nVidia 8600M issues were traced to that, and plenty of other BGA equipment since 2006 or so has failed rather early.

It's only horrid when the flux it comes with is crap. Most people try the cheapest garbage they can find on Amazon, and that's the problem.

I use Chipquik SAC305 with water-washable no-clean flux core and I actually prefer working with it over Sn63Pb37.

Yep, I was around for that shitshow with two laptops. Soldergate was annoying but to be honest there haven't been any similar issues at scale I'm aware of, as the issue was identified and fixed.

Solder comes in many different alloys. Some of them are really terrible. However some of the better ones are pretty good. Spend some money to find a good one. If you can find a manufacture they often have a lot of data and will tell you which is good for what. Often bad solder is great for some purpose, but that purpose may be something not useful for you (you probably don't need the maximum strength joints as one example), cheap while still working is useful at industrial scales, but odds are $75 of the most expensive solder will outlast your lifetime so why cheap out?

Your hobby really isn't worth breathing lungfuls of leaded-solder fumes. Manufacturing is done by robot, not you sitting over a desk (said as someone who was doing this till I realized it myself).

Lead-free solder can be a bitch to work with for some projects due to the higher melting point, and I do keep a spool of leaded wire around for that reason - but generally speaking for most hobbyist uses it's a non-issue as long as you have a relatively modern iron that can output enough heat (and retain it).

Yeah, a good iron and wire with a decent flux core helps a lot. Lead-free solder will never melt like butter the way leaded does, but I solder with it fairly often at work and it's not a show-stopper by any means.

Flux in general is probably the most important right after making sure you have an iron capable of handling the thermal recovery (you can't get the shit to stay liquid long enough if your iron can't handle keeping temp). The difference between relying on the flux core in even my leaded solder and adding a tap of my MG Chemicals flux when making a joint is night and day.

My lead-free joints come out nicely rounded and shiny just like my leaded ones with some practice and the right consumables. But I certainly have to break out hot air station more than I would when using leaded solder to deal with larger thermal masses (and why I will still break out my spool of leaded wire on rare occasion when I'm working with temp-sensitive components and just want it on the freaking board).

Yeah I use lead free for some stuff. I have switched back to lead for finer work since it just behaves better. Seems like the sweet spot for lead free is very small - too cold and you get a weak dome connection, too hot and it doesn't want to leave the tip.

Was hired as a software engineer at a tiny company, in April of this year, that produces surveillance cameras. They had me building and repairing their cameras which involved a non-trivial amount of soldering. They never told me I was handling lead and I wouldn't have known if I wasn't a curious person but it turns out they thought lead-free solder "sucked" and wouldn't switch.

Not nitpicking but solder for military and public transport applications is exempt and still used, due to better performance under vibration and shock.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com