All, Thank you all for your replies. I guess I forgot to mention that we also remove parts by fountain reflow. That would be our preferred method of component removal. If we couldn't remove a part with the fountain (clinched leads), our next best method (from a PWB safety standpoint) would be destructive removal where the leads are cut, the solder connections reheated, the leads removed followed by wicking. This isn't always the case with expensive military parts where it can be cost prohibitive to destroy the part. There was concern that pulsed solder extractors cause some type of thermal damage to the PTH's and the opinion of the manufacturing/assembly experts that responded was that there is no real damage other that the possible tearing of the barrel or pad when shearing the sweat joint. Again, thank you all for your responses. I just needed reassurance!! Steve McBride [log in to unmask] ################################################################ TechNet E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE TechNet <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF TechNet ################################################################ Please visit IPC web site (http://jefry.ipc.org/forum.htm) for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################