The exemption for medical equipment has been discussed recently times on this mail list.

One question I have for the manufacturers of medical equipment "Will you be able to make and market a product that contains leaded solder (or lead in any application) after the RoHS ban in 2006?"  I assume that many of the components and parts that go into "medical equipment" also go into non-medical equipment. Sun Microsystems used to (I hope we still do) sell workstations and other products to GE Medical and other manufacturers of medical systems.  We have no present intention of maintaining
two production lines, one for the lead-free market, and one for the much smaller medical equipment market.  After the ban all of our products will be lead-free, (although our servers may continue to useuse a leaded solder for sometime after July 2006, but I doubt the supply chain will allow us to stay leaded until the 2010 date for servers and storage arrays).

Since all other component and parts makers will also be going lead-free for the non-medical equipment/non-exempt marketplace (which, I have to believe, is the largest segment of the marketplace for electronics and electrical equipment) will they be willing to maintain two lines, one leaded and the other lead-free?
Have the medical equipment makers begun to canvass their supply chain to see if that is do-able?  What are the cost implications of this redundancy (if it happens at all)?  Can a single board utilize both leaded and lead-free solders?

Given the realities of the marketplace and the laws of physics, I just wonder if the limited exemptions are mere window dressing that can not be utilized in the real world.

--
Charles F. Dolci
Sun Microsystems, Inc.

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