Jonathan Here what I can say from your picture: Lead made of copper. Clipping operation pretty rough. We already had cases, where the clipping operation by hand caused the kind of cracks ( in the intermetallics) as seen on your picture. However, I believe that you have the cracks before you clip the leads. In this case it looks to me like no wetting. This could mean: - Insufficient tinning of the leads --> oxidised copper - Thin tinning --> Intermetallics - Old components --> Intermetallics - Contamination I suggest you let someone have a look into the solder joint ( microsection ) to find the cause of the defect. Just changing the preheat temperature doesn't seem a good idea to me. Have a great day Guenter Guenter Grossmann Swiss Federal Institute for Materials Testing and Research EMPA Centre for Reliability 8600 Duebendorf Switzerland Phone: xx41 1 823 4279 Fax : xx41 1823 4054 mail: [log in to unmask] --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8d To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet To temporarily halt delivery of Technet send the following message: SET Technet NOMAIL Search previous postings at: www.ipc.org > On-Line Resources & Databases > E-mail Archives Please visit IPC web site (http://www.ipc.org/html/forum.htm) for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.5315 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------