Standing room only at SMART Group lead free event

Citation

Starkey, P. (1999), "Standing room only at SMART Group lead free event", Soldering & Surface Mount Technology, Vol. 11 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/ssmt.1999.21911bab.001

Standing room only at SMART Group lead free event

Standing room only at SMART Group lead free event

A larger room had to be found at short notice to accommodate the crowd of over 150 who attended the SMART Group seminar on lead-free soldering at High Wycombe on 10 February. The level of support for this event was a clear indication of the level of concern about the proposed EC lead ban, and delegates received comprehensive update on the state of play (Plates 1 and 2).

Nick Jolly from DTI opened the session by reviewing the legislative background and stressing the near-certainty that the draft "WEEE Directive", covering issues of lead-free manufacturing, waste disposal and compulsory recycling, will be formally adopted by the Commission in 1999, such that a lead ban will become effective in Europe in 2004.

Brian Richards then introduced the NPL/ITRI team who had just completed an extensive DTI-sponsored survey. Amongst the wealth of data presented by Kay Nimmo and Carl Levoguer, one worrying fact which emerged was the remarkable lack of lead-free awareness in the SMEs.

Gary Griffiths and Jeff Borrman of Shields Environmental gave an amusing and highly informative perspective on PCB recycling, which illustrated what can be achieved in practice, even in the face of some of the more ridiculous aspects of well-intentioned but arguably ill-considered environmental legislation.

Presentations from supply-houses were avoided and the day remained refreshingly free from proprietorial promotion. Instead, excellent user-views, from Gerry Andrews of Marconi Communications and Ken Snowdon of Nortel, illustrated how the major telecommunications OEMs have taken the initiative to be well-prepared for changes ahead of legislative deadlines. Significantly, the two organisations had chosen to investigate different lead-free alloys, and in the knowledge that that the Japanese appear to have other preferences, it became clear that no single world-standard replacement for eutectic tin-lead is in sight.

Plate 1 Delegates attending the lead-free solders seminar

Plate 2 Left to right: Peter Swanson (SMART group-outgoing chairman), Bill Plumbridge (Professor of Materials ­ Open University), Brian Haken (excec. director ­ PCIF & EFIP), Carl Levoquer (senior research scientist NPL ­ National Physical Laboratory), Nick Jolly (DTI), Kay Nimmo (group mgr solders ITRI ­ International Tin Research Institute), Ken Snowden (research mgr ECO Design & HDI Nortel), Dr Brian Richards (prinicipal research scientist ­ NPL), Mike Judd (SMART ­ conference organiser)

However, encouraging results were reported; there would no insurmountable problems in introducing lead-free techniques into production, although processing windows would become even tighter and assemblies would generally have to endure higher process temperatures.

Although only limited reliability data were currently available, the indications were that no fundamental problems existed, provided that components with suitable lead-free terminations were available.

The availability of lead-free components was a major area of concern, particularly if component manufacturers were faced with the prospect of providing specific finishes for the European market.

After Bill Plumbridge had explained some of the techniques used at the Open University to measure reliability in performance, Brian Richards gave an overview summary of the facts as known to date.

He drew the following conclusions:

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  Lead-free soldering is technologically possible; reliability indications are good, but key implementation issues need to be addressed.

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  No drop-in replacement is available.

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  The principal barriers to implementation are:

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    limited information;

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    lack of understanding in SMEs;

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    component availability.

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  No alternative yet exists for high-lead, high temperature alloys.

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  Equipment must be modified to accommodate higher process temperatures.

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  Availability: solders, fluxes and PCBs are available but there is limited component availability and multinational suppliers are reluctant to make specials for Europe.

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  Changeover sequence: components and PCBs must be changed first, before changing solder.

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  There are large variations in awareness (OEM high, SME low).

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  There is a scarcity of in-depth R&D under way, and limited reliability information.

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  There is an urgent need to disseminate information via trade organisations, trade press and scientific meetings.

And suggested as the way forward:

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  Government help for industry by way of a central forum, with cross-sector co-operation and a clear road-map.

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  An awareness campaign for SMEs

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  R&D networking.

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  Co-ordination of reliability data.

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  A co-ordinated approach to the component availability issue, with government involvement.

The good news for PCB fabricators was the indication that lead-free solders are compatible with a wide range of established solderable finishes. Even HASL works with lead-free and Harold Marshall mentioned over lunch that the US-based HASL User Group had already completed successful trials, although samples which Ken Snowdon subsequently passed round would struggle to satisfy current goods inwards inspection standards on cosmetic appearance. Several comments had already been made about the characteristic appearance of lead-free joints, and it was clear that inspection criteria would have to be updated.

Acknowledging all the progress that had been made to date, Brian Haken made it clear in the final presentation that he remained unconvinced that a satisfactory solution was in sight, and re-stated his concern that the issues of cost, compatibility, reliability and reworkability, and the lack of world-wide uniformity, together with the implications of competitive disadvantage for the European electronics industry still had to be resolved before lead-free manufacture could be realistically implemented, and that he would maintain his lobby that the proposed legislation was premature. Brian's comments were, not unexpectedly, very contentious and initiated a lively open-forum debate to round off the session.

Feedback from SMART Group members has been unprecedented in praise of such a useful and informative day.

(Details of individual presentations will shortly be available on the SMART web-site www.smtuk@demon.co.uk

Pete StarkeySMART Group Technical Committee member