I think it's safe to say that leaded solder is much versatile and much easier to work with but the main problem is, in my opinion, the health effects of lead. It's no joke.

Video and audio are not synchronized. I tried 240, 360 and 480 with the same results. The other videos play fine on the same browser.

I’ve been an electronics hobbyist since the early 90’s. I finally got myself a Technician job with a large company, only to find out they use LeadFree solder only. 😮 It’s terrible to work with and I suck at using it My dream job has now become less enjoyable 😢

Another one! This is hilarious :D I'm expecting a similar follow up from Mike in my subscriptions list any minute now :P

+Yutaka Takenouchi The problem with lead-free is that it gets cracked much easily from temperature fluctuation stress, also it has higher melt point temperature putting more stress on component been soldered.

Love your shows. Best regards from Arne from denmark

Any thoughts on the possible danger of increased tin whisker growth associated with lead-free solder when using this method on power supply PCBs?

100K is not safe if your iron develops a mains to tip short! hmmm I wonder if i can still find that bit of indium solder I had.....

I believe another test could be used. Need a high current power supply (battery booster device that can start a car) and a means of controlling the current, and a means of measuring the massive currents this thing will need. Just use the board as a fuse and see what current pops it, and have fun proving the tin slug works.

Nice Dave but suggestion....It would've been more definitive if you had accurately weight the board before and after addition of the solder to get the weight of solder added

Pretty cool PCB.

let's not forget about the health risk of the flux used in lead free soldering being quite toxic on it's own, just saying.

I'm of the opinion that lead free RoHS solder is actually worse for the environment and worse for health and safety since it's chiefly responsible for the premature failure of much of today's consumer electronics. Apparently the lead free crap is not allowed in either aerospace or medical electronics because of this.

@EEVblog : What do you think about Sn48Bi52 (48% Tin, 52% Bismuth) lead free solder ? Have you used it ?

I got an Idea, how you can test it precisely: Weight both sorts of solder, you will put on and it should weight the same. Than put it on and put the PCB into the oven, so the solder will reflow. This should be perfect for exact tests.

Loving the thumbnail

does floating mean the voltage reading is not as accurate?

We tried some lead free solder at collage in 2008. It was horrid to work with, required higher temperature, didn't float properly and just made a mess on the pcb that was hard to clean off. I only use standard 60/40 lead since then, but if anyone could recommend something lead-free which works like that, I'd be happy to try it.

Would the resistance be reduced due to a larger skin effect?

"Difference over Original" Percent Increase & Decrease seem to confuse nearly everyone. The way to remember it is that you want to simply take the difference divided by the original. If something goes from 50 to 30 it decreases (50-30)/50 which is 40%. If something goes from 30 to 50 it increases (50-30)/30 which is 66%. The numerator is the same (50-30), it is what you define as the "starting value" or "original value" which makes the difference.

Hello dave, What do you think about the fluke 97 scopemeter? i got one from ebay, i paid about 330 $

The great tinting debate continues!

you can get it without the flux right?

The test in these videos are prompted by the common practice amongst electronics manufacturers of applying tin onto high current traces. The way these are applied is by simply leaving an opening in the solder mask on the traces to be coated, and the trace will pick up solder when passing through the wave or dip soldering. So it requires no added work. The cost of the solder is probably negligible compared to having someone soldering a wire onto the trace.

lol, did not noticed until your post =D

It might not be the cheapest, easiest or elegant but a thick gauge copper wire will beat solder or board traces any day. So if you are really stuck with needing low resistance or high current and there is not enough room on the board for a wide enough trace for the circuit, copper wire might be a reasonable solution. If you needed dozens to hundreds of amps or more an aluminium or copper bus bar might be in order. I know it is outside the scope of this but worth mentioning.

Couldn't you try this with high frequency signals? Would be interesting to see when the skin effect makes this practice useless.

Do you think lead-free solder with Silver (e.g. Sn95Ag4Cu1) would make any difference? Silver (on its own) of course has the highest conductivity of all elements (according to Wikipedia).

I doubt it'll make any significant difference to the resistance of the track, however it is much better to solder with!

If someone gets really picky about it, they can get two identical lengths and gauges of solder and measure the resistance using the same 4-wire method.

Does lead free conduct better than vice versa???

ΗΕΥ you could have just taken 1meter of both solders as they where (without soldering) and measure they're resistance...

A floating circuit is simply one that is not connected to earth ground, so it will have a "floating" state relative to the earth. This means that any electric field encountered would change the relative voltage to the Earth, making this relative voltage unpredictable. However, Dave is measuring the voltage between two points in the circuit, so the floating state of the circuit should not pose a problem to his measurements.

If you were trying to measure resistivity (which you're comparing with your method), then one flawed comparison is as good (bad) as any other flawed comparison. The resistivity has almost certainly been calculated under lab conditions before anyway, so it's re-inventing the wheel. As an indicator of whether a similarly inconsistent process such as wave soldering produces noticeable effects on resistivity - Dave’s method is a good approximation, albeit not statistically usable by any means.

I hate lead-free! It does work well for some things, like solder paste for SMT devices, but I hate it when I have to reflow stuff just because of problems with lead-free solder!

I tried lead free and it was terrible back then. I doubt it has gotten better in 5 years

Would measuring a hand soldered puddle, the way Dav did, be better? Hmmm....

Why is your voice out of sync with the video?

in sweden, the stores do only have lead free solder

Not a fair comparison. The cross sectional area and type of flux used will have an impact, even if they're the same outer diameter, there's no way to tell what the actual proportion of solder to flux in that section is.

LMAO over here.. Are you and Mike gonna test acid-core solder next? I added a 100K 1W resistor between my iron and the earth connection. I got tired of sparks! (Hey,we all get forgetful at times.) It's still plenty safe as far as ESD protection goes.

Not since you have several flux canals inside the wire, doubt they are exactly the same dimensions between the two manufacturers :)

Next time you should weight the solder i.e. put 500mg of both leaded and lead free solder on 1oz. copper tracks.

Stupid idea: Maybe the tinning isn't for the electrical connectivity but heat dissipation. And by the way: Copper is also in the tin, because tin "eats" copper. When you use a pure copper soldering tip, it get hollows by the time. If the thin already has copper in it, it is more saturated with copper and therefore less aggressive.

Yup

what do the military use? lead stuff?

Never seen Multicore without it (hence their name) but maybe...

I don't think that will be accurate, since the flux core diameter and composition will contribute to resistance as well.

Here's a more precise way of doing it: Try the same length of solder of the same thickness and same percentage of flux in it, so that the only variable is leaded vs lead free.

How about Sn-Ag-Cu? Just joking! Don't make another video on that lol. Looking forward to next vid.

I hear 3D printing going on in the background :)

If it's a high power mains supply, bang, there goes your hand...

Am I the only one these days that just can't live without proper lead solder. Modern health and safety regulations just suck!

1. Pause Video 2. Right Click 3. Stop Download 4. Profit (Pyscho-Dave)

Bang as in blow the ass out of the powersupply or bang as in "Pop goes the over current fuse" or Buzzz as the over current alarm goes off (depending on power supply)

Xhamster fume extractor ?!?!?!?

do you like lead free?

Hey dave are you a gamer ?.

Welcome to the nightmare of RoHS

Lead-free is great, i don't get what people are whining about.

99.3% Tin/0.7% copper? That's not solder! That's garbage. Normal people can't solder like that... Solder is made by the science of chemistry! I'd like to see Dave try that with a mixture of 96.35% Tin, 3.0% Silver, .5% Copper, and 0.15% Antimony.... more commonly known as Sparkfun;s "Special Blend". It's the ONLY unleaded solder worth buying IMO for special applications (costs more) like lightweight micro/mini 3D RC aircraft where an extra gram and added resistance is actually noticed.

I should send Dave a cow, it seems that he really needs one or two....

It's chinese solder, maybe it is normal solder sold as lead free.

Hysteria doesn't help make things safer.

Right click on the Video > Stop Download > You Win So Much!

I systematically avoid anything labelled "lead-free", it's pure virtue signaling BS.

Lead free solder is shit If you want lead free guys buy a soldering iron that heats up to 900c and use 22 carrot gold solder Well gold is far more conductive than lead and tin and silver but how do you use real gold solder for jewelry Jokeing on your electronics your soldering tips need to be glowing to melt it

Talk a lot to say a little

Made In China!!!