More on lead-free junk solder

Spot on. And the unthinking clueless rabble who support it only care about simplistic ideas like "lead is bad" despite its very valuable uses in many areas.

Even worse is that their nonsense has now actually become counter-productive. Lead-free soldering will result in shorter product lifetimes which will result in *more waste* !!!

Graham

Lead makes might fine bullets for the day that its time to replace a defective government.

Does anyone else see the irony in this? Their stupid directives are making more lead available to make the very ammunition that may be used to remove them from office, so the can be replaced by anyone with a brain.

I'm waiting for the day when they catch on to lead flashing on roofs. It's the perfect product for the job, and never needs replacing in the lifetime of the building. But wait ! Isn't that acid rain washing down over it year in year out? Must be causing huge quantities of that naughty lead stuff to be getting into our kids' brains and making the teachers look stupid. Better replace it with a lead-free product that costs four times as much, and leaks after 3 years ! Better yet, the new replacement product self degrades in just 10 years under the influence of the sun's UV !!

Excellent ! Draft the new Euro-reg right now, and work out some penalties for using the old stuff. Create a new department with an army of enforcement agents, and give them each a 4x4 so that they can get to the building sites without a problem ...

Seriously though, it's really beginning to feel like it's going that way. or is it just me ??

Arfa

Oh, I dunno.... I have some 95/5 tin/silver solder situations that have lasted 20+ years of exterior conditions. In point of fact, I chose that mix for just that reason. I also use the same mix for critical solders where it is a double-major PITA to get to them in case of future failure.

Peter Wieck Wyncote, PA

I bet that needs a hot iron ! d;~}

Arfa

No more so than regular 63/37, as it happens. Rosin core as well and rated for electronics. I use a fairly fine solder, and work on the theory that a short amount of hot iron is better for the components at hand than a longer amount of (slightly) lower heat. NOT CHEAP! But in the natural order of things, cheaper than a call-back.

Interesting. I'll take a further look into it.

Arfa

" snipped-for-privacy@aol.com" wrote in news:1179416815.521292.162120 @u30g2000hsc.googlegroups.com:

Melting Point.

You are correct, my 95/5 has been discontinued, the 'new' replacement is:

with a melting point of ~217C.

Peter Wieck Wyncote, PA

No way, ordinary consumers would understand and object to banning of lead flashing, whereas complaining about solder seems a bit too geeky and so won't make the news. The only time I ever saw anything about RoHS in the ordinary news was when some church-organ-maker was complaining because the traditional material for his lead organ pipes would be banned unless he replaced the electric blower with some kind of manual pump, to make it non-electric. Of course that got an exception, something like because it was a fixed installation in the building. I wonder if you nail down your TV to the floor.....

Seriously though, aluminium flashing (not alloy but very PURE aluminium) will last quite a long time in the rain (according to my grandfather who would probably have known, because he did build rooves over a period of well over half a century. He was also a big fan of lead paint and hated the new stuff because it wouldn't last hardly any time, probably not even

Chris

I use some that is 95/5 TIN/COPPER. it works ok. I just don't like the finish.

Jamie wrote in news:wg63i.47$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfe03.lga:

...

Not surprising as 95/5 tin/copper is NOT a eutectic mixture.

You do NOT want to use non eutectic mixtures as they pass through a plastic stage when cooling('cold solder joints' if disturbed during plastic state) and their melting point is higher than the eutectic.

Tin-Copper eutectic (Sn99.3/Cu0.7) 227 c Tin-Silver eutectic (Sn96.5/Ag3.5) 221 c CASTIN® eutectic (Sn96.2/Ag2.5/Cu0.8/Sb0.5) 216 c

CASTIN looks like a good bet.

Wiltshire | Archive | 2006 | March | 23 EU directive prompts fears for cathedral's organ

From the Salisbury Journal, first published Thursday 23rd Mar 2006.

MUSIC-LOVERS are keeping their fingers crossed that Salisbury Cathedral's historic Father Willis organ will be renovated before the latest EU directive comes into force a ruling that could silence the grand pipe organs found in cathedrals, churches and concert halls across the UK.

Salisbury's magnificent organ, built in 1877, is currently out of service, as its console is undergoing repair and restoration in Durham, along with the equally famous organ from the Royal Festival Hall in London.

The new directive from the European Commission aims to reduce the amount of lead used in electrical items and comes into force on July 1.

This week, Tim Hone, director of liturgy and music at Salisbury cathedral, said that, providing the organ's repair and updating was completed before that date, it would not contravene the directive.

He told the Journal: "We are anticipating its return around Easter, which will give us plenty of time. But if anything delays the work, we could run into problems."

He said the directive sought to minimise the amount of hazardous waste that finds its way into landfill. Lead is one such hazard and the new regulations permit electrical equipment to have a maximum of 0.1 per cent of their weight as lead.

Organ pipes, which are made from tin and lead to give them their distinct sound, can have a lead content of 50 per cent.

Mr Hone said that, although organ pipes were mainly mechanical devices, they relied on electrical motors to power blowers, which move air through them and that brought the organ into the definition of an electrical product.

But organ experts are baffled as to why the directive should apply to organs, because, when organs are rebuilt, the lead is not thrown away but is reused in new or different pipes.

The directive has worried the Institute of British Organ Building because it could see the end of the 1,000-year-old craft of organ-building in Britain. The institute said: "There is a very black cloud on the horizon".

Tony Baldry, Tory MP for Banbury, is urging the government to intervene to save the organ. The department of trade and industry has warned that Britain must comply with the directive, although exemptions could be granted by the EU.

Mr Hone said that, unless an exemption were made or the directive redrafted, Salisbury will face the problem again the next time the organ pipes need cleaning and restoration.

from

-- Diverse Devices, Southampton, England electronic hints and repair briefs , schematics/manuals list on

I saw a similar thing up here, but I think in the end, it turned out to be hysterical nonsense, and that the organ builders had basically done what the people who made this crap legislation in the first place had done - which is to not to do their homework right in the first place. I seem to remember reading subsequently that it was not the pipework that was going to be affected, but the control electronics. I'm no expert in pipe organ restoration, but I understand that when they are rebuilt and brought up to date, various control electronics are added now, and that it was going to be this that would be affected. One such organ builder complained that it was going to put his current restoration project back six months, because that was how long it was going to take his electronics supplier, to tool up for the legislation.

Arfa

How about this one:

Not lead, but mercury in compact flourescent bulbs, and what happens when you have imbecile who gets the government involved.

Jerry

It seems to be the way worldwide.

I've come to the conclusion that politicians need to be seriously brought back down to earth. Our countries are democracies in name only and often more like party political dictatorships.

Graham

I was reading an interesting dissertation on this very subject recently, and it seems that a lot of it is down to the fact that we have many 'career' politicians now, rather than responsible grownups who have served an apprenticeship in life, and worked and lived and loved, before deciding to go into politics to try to better everyone's lot. These career types have been to university and taken a degree in political science or some such other 'useless' discipline, and then have gone straight into the political arena without ever having any experience of life at the sharp end. The only thing that they have been prepared for by their studies, is the creation of half arsed schemes based on half arsed theoretical models, that have no basis in reality.

Seemed like a very valid insight to me. The waters have also now been muddied by politically 'global' issues such as terrorism and climate change, which all parties want to subscribe to, and which only serves to stagnate effective opposition, and squeeze all policy in one direction. Once this starts to happen, then it becomes very easy to find yourself in a one way street to totalitarianism and complete government control of all aspects of our lives. I sincerely believe that this is what we are beginning to see now, and that worries me more than a little ...

Arfa

Yes! Then we have all of the "activist" groups which raise money by frightening people with all sorts of dire predictions. The current one of course being "global warming" or as they're now calling it "climate change". As if the climate never, ever changes. After reading some of the alleged "climate change" MBE, I've decided that climate "science" belongs in the same category as the social "sciences". One builds a model, then "validates" it using statistical methods, and this "proves" something. Of course the data is specially chosen to fit the hypothesis.

Jerry

Absolutely Jerry. See if you can get hands on a copy of that TV prog that I told the others about. Made by UK TV company "Channel 4" and called 'The Great Global Warming Swindle'. I understand that it is available on YouTube. Essential viewing on the subject.

Arfa