- Joined
- Jan 1, 2000
- Messages
- 16,233
- Reaction score
- 4,202
- Points
- 113
- Age
- 81
- My Satellite Setup
-
Triple Dragon, Dreambox 8000, Echostar AD3000ip, TBS6522,6925,6983 PCie cards.
Gibertini 1.25m motorised dish driven by the AD3000, with either Inverto BU Quad or Norsat / XMW Ka LNBs . SMW 1.05m + 3 other dishes. Speccy: Promax HD Ranger+
- My Location
- The Flatlands of East Anglia
Using lead-free solder causes tin whiskersto form on circuit boards and components. Pure tin-plated components also cause the whiskers to form over time -
_http://nepp.nasa.gov/WHISKER/photos/index.html
Tin/lead solder is now banned for sale in Europe because of damage to the environment (for instance Maplin only have the lead-free solder now). Lead-free solder needs a greater melting point to solder effectively, which can damage the components you are using it on. Luckily I have enough of the old stuff for my projects.
Not sure if equipment manufactured in the Asia have to use lead-free, but apparently baffling faults in PC motherboards etc. could be put down to the whisker effect.
In 1998 the failure of the Galaxy IV satellite was diagnosed as being caused by the dreaded whiskers.
Llew
_http://nepp.nasa.gov/WHISKER/photos/index.html
Tin/lead solder is now banned for sale in Europe because of damage to the environment (for instance Maplin only have the lead-free solder now). Lead-free solder needs a greater melting point to solder effectively, which can damage the components you are using it on. Luckily I have enough of the old stuff for my projects.
Not sure if equipment manufactured in the Asia have to use lead-free, but apparently baffling faults in PC motherboards etc. could be put down to the whisker effect.
In 1998 the failure of the Galaxy IV satellite was diagnosed as being caused by the dreaded whiskers.
Llew