[sdiy] The Dreaded ROHS

[Stewart Pye]

Hi,

I don't want to get into this debate, other than to say that in my 
experience as a repair technician there are more solder joint related 
failures now than there were when it was all lead based, and it's harder 
to solder to lead free PCB's with lead solder than it is to lead based 
PCB's. A possible flipside of this is that there will be more crap going 
into landfill because it is less reliable and I'm sure there's a lot 
more bad stuff in those products than just lead.

If manufacturers made products that had a long lifespan and could be 
easily repaired there wouldn't be so much crap going into landfill and 
thus not using so many resources in the first place. I've had a crazy 
thought about governments testing products for reliability and ease of 
repair and taxing those items that are throwaway to subsidise easily 
repairable items. The logistics and politics of it all make it 
practically impossible but surely something can be done. eg: They *used* 
to have access panels on the bottom of most hifi amplifiers. What's 
happened?

I'm sorry. I started my own rant here...

Stew.