Steve, Way to come forward with your dirty shorts, this sort of information can help a lot of people avoid a bomb. We have had our current wave solder machine for about six years and it still looks new and operates every well with almost no down time. The secret is maintenance and operator pride. I use to do consulting on wave solder machines and often saw them stuffed in little sheds and dirty corners because they are stinky and dirty. We have ours right in front and make it an important part of customer tours. Another important thing we do is having an annual maintenance done by the factory. This gives a new set of eyes to look at the machine for little things that we may overlook day to day. Also the technician gets to see all kinds of problems with poorly maintained machines in the field and can help you dodge a bullet. When the factory tech comes to perform maintenance on our machine they are always amazed at the condition of our machine and tell us some whore stories of what they see elsewhere. Hope this helps support Steve's findings. Ken Bloomquist Sr. Principal Process Engineer PRIMEX Aerospace Company P.O. Box 97009 Redmond, WA 98073-9709 www.primextech.com Ph: 425-885-5000 FAX: 425-882-5786 [log in to unmask] Northcon/99, Board Member <www.northcon.org> Electronics Manufacturers Association (EMA), Secretary <www.ema-wa.org> ################################################################ 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 ################################################################