Erik Knise wrote:
> I've soldered up a lot of prototype boards without solder mask but
> never a milled board. The solder will stick anywhere your soldering
> iron touches. I had to do fine pitch IC's and 0201/0402 parts and I
> made a mess a few times. You might need to try a different tip so you
> are only heating the pad and not letting it touch the ground plane
> too. The only other way is to solder mask your board or as Jamie
> said, increase your isolation distance. I have been using Weller ETR
> 1/16" Narrow Screwdriver tips for years and I love them.
> http://www.hmcelectronics.com/product/Weller/ETR They give me the
> control to put the soldering iron exactly where I want even in
> confined spaces. I have a variety of soldering tips but this is my
> go to one for most jobs. When soldering I rarely add flux for most
> standard parts but when doing re-work I always use lots of flux.
> When I took my IPC J-STD-001 test I found out I was using too much
> solder. It really doesn't require that much to make a good joint.
There are always tricks to soldering fine pitch boards.
I have many prototype boards, 6mil lines 8mil spacing, tinned
with no solder mask. My trick is to use liquid RMA, Rosin Medium
Activation, flux along with the flux in .040" quality solder.
The stuff is liquid as water. However, it is slightly corrosive
and needs to be cleaned well afterwards.
1. I use a fine chisel tip temperature controlled iron.
The flux is in a small Gerber baby food jar and apply it
liberally with a tooth pick. The flux is active enough to
eliminate surface tension on the melted solder so bridging
is almost non existent.
2. For surface mount ICs I purposely run the solder along with
the RMA flux over all the pins and after use "Solder Wicket"
desoldering braid to remove excess solder.
Fast and works like a charm.
Note! I'm not a fan of the really small diameter solder.
I find the .040" solder works better because if has a bit of
"heat sinking" quality which slows down it's melting rate
and gives me a bit more control.
Duane
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