[sdiy] RoHS

[Ray Wilson]

Music From Outer Space will be switching over to RoHS compliant PC boards 
slowly and after June I will only ship RoHS compliant boards to EU 
countries. Others will continue to get leaded boards until they are all 
gone. Then I will only ship RoHS compliant boards. Temp compensators will be 
shipped for repair of old equipment and personal use only (lead in the 
solder coated leads and thus NOT RoHS compliant). What your idea of personal 
use is... well that's none of my business.

I got some lead-free test PC boards and the solder I regularly use (leaded) 
flowed fine. I don't have any lead free solder to test with so... we'll see.

The environmentalists behind this are probably glad to make any advance 
toward a cleaner environment for the world of tomorrow. I agree that its a 
drag that they don't start with alternative fuels for transportation. But 
its a David versus Goliath kind of thing... except with no sling and no 
stones. There are ultra-rich, global, non-politically affiliated interests 
on this planet that don't want to see an alternative energy strategy until 
they figure out how to control and wildly profit from whatever it may be. 
That will happen when the exact last drop of oil spurts from the earth or 
when hell freezes over (whichever comes first). There was a movie called 
"Chain Reaction" which, while it was only a movie (with Keanu Reeves),  made 
you think.

Cheers all and may you have a happy and "lead free" New Year

Ray



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "R. D. Davis" <rdd at rddavis.org>
To: <synth-diy at dropmix.xs4all.nl>
Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 9:46 PM
Subject: Re: [sdiy] RoHS


> Quothe harrybissell, from writings of Tue, Jan 10, 2006 at 
> 10:46:24PM -0500:
>> Again... my point
>>
>> How many MiniMoogs get landfilled / incinerated every day ?
>
> Only a very, very, sick person would do that!
>
>> OTOH... how may of you have an 8086, 286, 386, 486, 586, 686...
>> still in your possession.  How many cell phones have you owned ?
>
> Still have my original C64, my old genuine IBM PC-XT, a IBM PC-AT,
> some 386 systems, 486 systems, 586 and 686, etc... not to mention
> various micros like a TRS-80, C-128, Dynabyte 5100, Franklin something
> or other (Ace?) and some real apples, from the Apple II to the little
> one-piece Macs through a G3 mac whose CPU I just replaced and
> overclocked to about 400 MHz.  Not to mention a PDP-8 and some 11's,
> etc.
>
> I have about 50 cell phones... all about alike.  Got used to my old
> Qualcomm, needed a replacement (still have the one that doesn't work,
> but wasn't successful at attempting to solder an SMT connection which
> came apart; Verizon replaced one for free, when it fell on the ground
> and a horse stepped on it... oops... guess that got landfilled, alas),
> and found someone selling a lot of 50 on them on e-bay for less than
> the cost of a replacement battery.  Mostly good, high-capacity
> batteries, came with them as well.  Anyone need a spare QCP-820 or two
> for a trade?
>
> Oh heck, I can't even bear to discard an old RCA 25" TV (branded as
> "Mural TV"... picked it up for $1 as surplus from a local community
> college about 20 years ago) set which has been on its side in the
> basememt for a decade or so; it had a beautiful picture it, but that
> HV tube in it wasn't all that well shielded and probably emitted lots
> of X-Rays despite that little bit of shielding.
>
> Of course, I am tempted to get rid of a spare 25" picture tube, that's
> taking up useable space, which I nabbed as part of an old TV set that
> someone had put out for the trash about 25 years ago, which I
> scavenged lots of good components from. :-)
>
> I still repair my 1984 VCR when belts in it go bad too...
>
> ...but then, I also drive 30+ year old cars and like to play with
> vacuum tube circuits.
>
> So... How is that for proof that electronic devices with leaded
> components aren't the problem, that people who discard them are the
> problems? :-)
>
>> This message was sent from a 6x86... recycled from a 486. On a dial
>
> Same here... couldn't bear to throw out the old motherboards; they might
> be useful for something or other someday.
>
>> up modem, with genuine rotary-dial telephone. Sorry, never owned
>> a cell phone.  What a luddite, eh ???   (or is that a LEADdite ???)
>
> Nah... sounds sensible to me... I still have one of those hand-set
> modems, and some genuine Bell System modems and calling units, but
> must admit to not using those.
>
> -- 
>   R. D. Davis                The difference between humans & other 
> animals: an
> www.rddavis.org  410-744-4900    unnatural belief that we're above Nature 
> & her
>     Dangling Spiders              other creatures, using dogma to justify 
> such
>   Electronic Music Studio           beliefs and to justify much human 
> cruelty.