As a worthy member of this panel might say, "it depends". On what does 
it depend?
- the desired reliability of your end-product under what conditions
- the quality of your incoming water and the nature of the impurities
- the type of cleaning machine
- the type of drying machine
- tolerance of physical aspect
- whether you are obliged to recycle water
- whether you wish to conformally coat
- whether you are able to conform to waste water regulations
- etc.

Put it this way: I have, in my heyday, installed literally hundreds of 
water cleaning systems. I can think of only two where they were able to 
dispense with deionisation for telecomms exchange systems. These were 
characterised by:
- very soft water with low TDS
- mechanical removal of the last rinse water (not evaporative drying)
- very tight process control throughout
- no conformal coating

As you are in the UK and you have a Scottish name, let me make a guess 
that may be in Scotland. If your water comes from a peat area (e.g., 
Loch Katrine, Western Highlands or the Pentlands), with a low pH and it 
is not adulterated by too much additives, you may be lucky and get away 
with it BUT - and this is important - you must qualify your process to 
make sure you can. I wonder whether it's worth the risk, though.

Brian

Richard Strathie wrote:
> We have been asked to look at replacing our water wash cycle in our lead free 
> assembly process with a de-ionised wash.  
> I thought de-ionised wash had become redundant with water soluable fluges.
> Deos anyone have any recomendations ?
> 
> Regards
> Richard
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------
> Technet Mail List provided as a service by IPC using LISTSERV 15.0
> 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 15.0
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
-----------------------------------------------------