Steve -
Thanks for the clarification (and likely vindication of your oven).  Sounds
like your customer had a dubious experience with an earlier IR or
IR/Convection oven.  These were very sensitive to loading and not nearly as
efficient as today's Convection Dominant ovens in terms of heat transfer
capability.  Definitely do the tests and if you need guidance in test
specifics, contact me off the Technet.

As far as absolutely needing nitrogen - not likely. Unless you are using an
oxygen sensitive material in your assembly that requires a reduced oxygen -
inert atmosphere (a particular no-clean formulation or OSP) nitrogen is not an
absolute requirement.  There has been quite a bit written about this as well
as posted to the Technet so I won;t bother re-iterating it now.  I have an
article or two on it on my Website and Heller has a paper as well (See their
website).

So much for the customer always being right....

Regards,

Phil Zarrow
ITM, Inc.
Durham, NH  USA
www.ITM-SMT.com

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