Here is the basic information on the cleaning survey conducted by the SMART
Group. It covers the changes in clean and no clean technology from 1991 to 1996.
For further information and a copy of the survey contact the SMART Group office.


CLEANING ALTERNATIVES FOR THE 
ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY

UK SURVEY RESULTS
1991 to 1996

by 
Bob Willis

THE SMART GROUP
86 EASTON STREET
HIGH WYCOME
BUCKS HP11 1LT

TEL: 01494 465217  FAX: 01494 473975
Email: [log in to unmask]
World Wide Web Page: http://nmrc.ucc.ie/smart


The following survey results show the general changes that have taken place in
the electronics industry for cleaning printed board assemblies. The results were
obtained from three individual surveys conducted at cleaning seminars organised
by National Physics Laboratory, Electrovert Consulting Services and The SMART
Group.

The seminars were organised in Scotland and Ireland during October 1992 and in
England during June 1991. Over 150 people attended the seminar in England with
70 people in Scotland and over 30 people in Ireland. A copy of the survey
questionnaire sheet is attached to the hard copy results. 

The results are shown in graphical form and provide the basic data obtained from
the survey. The intention of the surveys was to give a basic idea of the
direction being taken by those people attending the individual technical events.

The survey was repeated by The SMART Group during October 1993. The results
obtained were based on 85 responses from England, Ireland and Scotland. 

The same survey has most recently been repeated by circulating to the SMART
Group membership via mail, The SMART Group Internet Forum "SMART-E-Link" and on
the IPC Internet Forum "Technet". The results obtained are based on a total of
95 responses.

Bob Willis

England June 1991

The results were obtained from a survey conducted in England and were taken from
the largest group of over 170 delegates.

The companies represented at the seminar (49%) were mainly medium volume
companies, assembling between 100 to 1000 boards per week.

The results from the England survey indicated again that MIL/IPC specifications
are the most often used guide to printed board cleanliness.   

Although the need to change has been highlighted in many publications it has
been indicated at each of these seminars that there is a reluctance to make a
decision on an alternative to CFC cleaning.

The results from the survey in England indicated that no-clean was the preferred
option although it was not as popular as it was in Scotland and Ireland. The
lower percentage figures for the no-clean option may have been due to the time
delay between the three surveys.

To provide a better understanding of the UK's view on cleaning alternatives the
results of the three surveys have been combined. The combined results in terms
of the direction which is being taken on alternatives to CFC does radically
change the results.

During this survey the bulk of the companies (76%) were assemblers producing
100-1000 boards per week.

The MIL/IPC specifications were again the most quoted documents and used  as a
reference.

Still at this point 56% of assembly facilities were using CFC as a cleaning
agent.

In terms of future plans no clean was considered to be the best option for the
future with 36% and aqueous second with 22%.

Scotland and Ireland October 1992

During the initial seminar held in Scotland 80% of the people attending were
from companies involved in assembling printed board, many of which were from
small and medium volume manufactures.

The highest percentage (39%) of companies were assembling between 100-1000
boards per week. The smallest group were those who were only assembling 1-100
boards per week.

The most popular specifications used for cleanliness assessment were the MIL/IPC
standards which were generally the most popular standards for each of the
surveys.

The existing method most commonly used during 1991/2 for cleaning electronic
assemblies was CFC 113 (56%), which shows the slow change in the electronics
industry. 

The process which is becoming the favoured choice as an alternative to the use
of CFC 113 is the no-clean option (49%). As the use of nitrogen is also
considered a no clean option, this raises the total to 57% who favour the
no-clean approach.

The results of the survey conducted in Ireland provided similar results to
Scotland with 82% of those attending being directly involved with assembly of
printed boards.

The survey results from Ireland tended to be based on larger companies who were
producing between 100-5000 boards per week.

The specifications most often used by companies in Ireland were the MIL/IPC
documents which may in this case have been expected as many of the companies
represented are US based manufacturers.

Less than 50% of Irish manufacturers were using CFC 113 as a cleaning solvent.
Aqueous cleaning has always been a popular technique favoured by companies based
in Ireland, again mainly influenced by the US manufacturers.


As was the case in Scotland, the Irish results indicate that no-clean is the
most popular process for the future. If the nitrogen results were also added to
the no-clean figure this would yield a figure of over 60% who were in favour of
no-clean.

SMART Membership Survey October 1993

The results were based on responses from 85 companies who were members of the
SMART Group in England, Ireland and Scotland.

The responses on this survey were based on 88% assemblers and 12% suppliers to
the industry. Of the assemblers the largest group were assembling between
1000-5000 boards a week, with 27% assembling more than 5000 per week.

In terms of cleaning standards 34% quoted the Mil standard as their reference
document. 52% of the assemblers did not have a standard for cleanliness.

Cleaning of board assemblies was undertaken using CFC113 by 28% of companies
with 40% currently using no clean technology. The use of aqueous and semi
aqueous were fairly evenly split at 13%.

The future direction was dominated by no clean technology with 65% of companies
choosing to eliminate cleaning. A further 6% were to embark on the use of
nitrogen which again indicates the use of no clean making that the preferred
choice. 

SMART Membership Survey January 1996

The final survey results are shown below and also illustrated in the attached
graphs.  This data is considered to be the most up to date information on the
trends in the industry.


Company
OEM 	67%
CONTRACTOR 	29%
SUPPLIER 	4%

Boards per week
1-100  	16%
100-1000 	23%
1000-5000 	30%
>5000 	31%

Cleaning specification
MINISTRY OF DEFENCE 	3%
MIL/IPC STANDARDS 	49%
BRITISH TELECOM 	6%
NONE 	42%

Present cleaning technique
FREON/ARKLONE 113 	3%
AQUEOUS (WATER) 	21%
SEMI AQUEOUS 	14%		
NO CLEAN TECHNOLOGY 	54%
NITROGEN 	5%
OTHER SOLVENTS 	3%

Future Technique
FREON/ARKLONE 113 	0%
AQUEOUS (WATER) 	10%
SEMI AQUEOUS 	10%		
NO CLEAN TECHNOLOGY 	70%
NITROGEN 	6%
OTHER SOLVENTS	4%



The surveys were conducted by Bob Willis of Electronic Presentation Services.
Further copies of these results may be obtained by contacting The SMART Group,
not the author, the address of which appears on the front cover of this report.

The results are available free of charge, please do not photocopy this document
as the SMART Group would like to gauge the level of interest in this
information.

For further information on the survey, contact Bob Willis:
Tel: 01245 351502
Fax: 01245 496123
Email: [log in to unmask]
Home Page: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/bwillis