Steve, hello, First of all - you are absolutely right. In case of process indicator I send a photograph rather than product. Apart of the IMC issue, unneeded rework will affect the PCB reliability - pads lifting, vias cracking and other goodies. Tell your inspectors on my behalf - extra rework equals damage. Secondly - if I remember correctly - this is a long debate: didn't you write about it some months ago? Regards Ofer Cohen Manager - Quality, Reliability and Production Technologies Seabridge - a Siemens company -----Original Message----- From: TechNet [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Steve Gregory Sent: Tuesday, November 02, 2004 03:02 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: [TN] Process Indicators... Hi All!! I've been getting into a number of debates about "Process Indicators" as described in the IPC-610...mostly with our inspectors. I know their hearts are in the right place, but it seems that many times they will reject the assemblies with "Process Indicators" back to our operators to touch them up, so that they look more like the "Target Condition", to be more cosmetically pleasing. I've tried to explain things as best I can, but find that sometimes our operators are touching up way more solder joints than they need too...they're being "trained", as it were, by our inspectors. The operators know that if something isn't "pretty" enough, it's going to come back to them...so they're putting more labor into product than they should. I'm trying to find some way, any way, to be able to show our inspectors that to touch-up something because it doesn't look like the target condition, doesn't mean one is making things any better...I understand that beauty is in the eye of beholder. There was some talk in the past about the Intermetallic Layer being thickened during subsequent reflow cycles, and causing fractures, but Werner said that he's never seen a failure because of a thick Intermetallic layer. Process Indicators may happen as spelled out in the -610, sometimes not only because of the assembly process, but because of the design, or other factors. I look at Process Indicators as a "Flag" to investigate whether or not the issues can be addressed and resolved properly, if they can't be resolved, then it's not a defect. Am I wrong about this? As always, TIA! -Steve Gregory- --------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8e 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 or (re-start) delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL or (MAIL) To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/archives Please visit IPC web site http://www.ipc.org/contentpage.asp?Pageid=4.3.16 for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-615-7100 ext.2815 ----------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8e 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 or (re-start) delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL or (MAIL) To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/archives Please visit IPC web site http://www.ipc.org/contentpage.asp?Pageid=4.3.16 for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-615-7100 ext.2815 -----------------------------------------------------