When you are seeing spikes on wave solder there are a number of things to consider. 1. Is the boards being fluxed correctly and is the temperature profile correct. 2. Could the dwell time in the solder be too long. 3. If the spikes are on one component it may be worth checking the solderability. It is unlikely that the copper content in the solder will be too high as the rate at which copper dissolves in solder reduces as the copper content increases so at normal operating temperatures it tends to be self regulating. However, you should be doing regular checks on your solder anyway to be sure! Regards, Neil Neil Atkinson -----Original Message----- From: Bev Christian [ mailto:[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]> ] Sent: 27 February 2002 23:35 Subject: Re: Solder Projections Mr. Pollak, High copper content in your solder can cause spikes... or amateur hand solderers like myself are very good at forming spikes. There may be other reasons that some of our "older" regulars can contribute. I looked in IPC/EIA J-STD-006 and it lists max impurity levels for different elements, but does not give reasons why they are individually considered impurities. You may be able to find this info from some of the more common reference books for our industry, the titles of which you can find by doing a search of the TechNet archives from the IPC homepage. regards, Bev Christian Research in Motion -----Original Message----- From: Mr. Leslie A. Pollak [ mailto:[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]> ] Sent: February 27, 2002 3:57 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [TN] Solder Projections Hi, Could soemone tell me what causes solder projections or what we call icicles. Or point us to IPC documentation that would help us. Thanks Mr. Leslie A. Pollak ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- 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 e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest 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 <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 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- ________________________________________________________________________ This e-mail has been scanned for all viruses by Star Internet. The service is powered by MessageLabs. For more information on a proactive anti-virus service working around the clock, around the globe, visit: http://www.star.net.uk ________________________________________________________________________