Richard, I recall having the same problem ourselves a couple of years ago. Cards that had peelable mask preapplied would harden through reflow to the extent that the mask was almost impossible to remove. Checking the reflow profile showed no reason to suspect abnormal heating. It would seem the mask was designed to cope with wave solder but not reflow. One solution is to apply a selective mask post reflow/pre wave, which we do for some parts/areas needing masking. This can be done by hand, or by selective masking equipment such as Camelot or Asymtek selective coating systems (although you need to have a resonable volume of product to justify the cost of buying one). The other solution is to talk with the vendor to see what conditions the mask should be used under. Regards Evan Evan Jones Manufacturing/Test Engineer Bluegum Technology Pty Ltd PO Box 609, Wangaratta, Australia, 3676 Ph: 61 3 5720 2539 Fax: 61 3 5720 2412 Internet: [log in to unmask] "Hamilton, Richard -4454" <[log in to unmask]> on 05/02/99 05:30:55 Please respond to "TechNet E-Mail Forum." <[log in to unmask]>; Please respond to "Hamilton, Richard -4454" <[log in to unmask]> To: [log in to unmask] cc: (bcc: Evan Jones/BGT) Subject: [TN] Peelable mask Hello all, I wanted to get a 'heads up' on a possible problem so I asked this several months ago and got no reply. I thought, Great! This is not a problem!! Well, not so sure now. The peelable masking we are using on our PWB's seems to be getting tougher to remove after reflow process has been added to the system. Anyone have any suggestions, guidelines, or other input on what to look for or what to look out for? We will have to start looking at other vendors for the masking. Sorry but I cannot tell you the mfgr right now, our PWB designer is out today. If this information is needed, let me know and when I get it I will let you know. Thanks gang. Richard Hamilton Clemar Mfg. / Rain Bird [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's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################ ################################################################ 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's web site (http://www.ipc.org) "On-Line Services" section for additional information. For technical support contact Hugo Scaramuzza at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.312 ################################################################