soldering small surface mount discretes

...or scared to death about a poor design, and hoping some mythological bypass scheme would save his ass.

The highest voltage rated polymer aluminum caps I have seen is 20 volts.

Digikey does have a Z5U 100V 22 uF ceramic cap with radial leads for sale, but at a unit price of $27.17. Yikes!

I'd really like to avoid any kind of electrolytic. The ceramics are on the cusp of being practical (the price goes from something like $1 to something like $30 as the specs get reasonably close to the 60uF/100V I'd like to have).

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Yikes!

John

Polyester film caps are cheaper in that range. Digikey lists a 68uF 75 VDC for about $16, but don't have them in stock:

He can use my design, but note that the two oscillators tend to lock together, which defeats the whole point of the circuit.

Ok! Note that I can home-etch PCBs for 0201 and 01005 parts, so if you just want to try soldering them, buy a couple parts and make a test board. The lack of a mask doesn't hurt here, the parts are too small.

Yup.

Solder paste. I dab some on the pcb before putting the part on it, so the paste is between the part and the pad. Heat from the iron just melts the paste, I don't actually transfer *solder* from the iron to the part. The iron is usually pretty bare, which also keeps the solder glob from pulling on the part too.

Even if you pre-solder one of the pads and reheat it, remember that the heat goes through the part to the other pad too. So, when you do the second pad, you still need to hold the part down.

I use a 10 diopter (3.5x) magnifier visor for the smallest parts (5d

A flux pen on the pcb helps too.

I have 20/10 vision (laser corrected) but still need magnifiers to work on PCBs. I find the visor is the best solution for me.