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I recall as a kid, soldering circuit boards. I distinctly remember the label "low lead" and also the smell of the smoke it made. At times, and this is stupid, i
by verelo 5y ago
I recall as a kid, soldering circuit boards. I distinctly remember the label "low lead" and also the smell of the smoke it made. At times, and this is stupid, i would find myself chewing on a piece of the unburnt solder as i debugged a circuit board. Mistakes were made...
- emteycz 5y agoWhen I was a kid, I explicitly didn't use non-leaded solder because I liked the smell of the leaded one. Mistakes indeed
- bushbaba 5y agoI too used leaded solder. But only because it was easier to use than the lead free versions
- Teknoman117 5y agoI mostly used lead-free solder as a kid (1990's and 2000's) but I still recall the acrid smell of flux fumes. I've accidentally had a few good whiffs that left me recoiling and coughing a bit. I wonder if that'll have any long term effects...
- jacobolus 5y agoThe fumes from non-leaded solder are worse for you (make sure to have good ventilation). The lead doesn’t go into the air; the fumes are from flux. As long as you don’t eat the solder, and wash your hands after soldering, there’s no problem with hobby soldering using lead solder. The reason to prefer lead-free solder is primarily because at industrial scale with tons of trashed electronics the lead becomes an environmental pollutant. For hobbyists, lead solder is easier to work with, and not a serious risk.
- klyrs 5y agoPretty safe bet that kids playing with lead solder didn't wash their hands afterwards.
- qbasic_forever 5y agoYou were smelling the rosin in the solder burning. All of that lead exposure likely pales in comparison to what was happening driving in a car with windows down (when AC wasn't common) and all the cars around you were burning leaded gas with zero emissions control equipment like catalytic converters. You were just getting blasted by air full of lead and other combustion products.
- Eduard 5y agoAC in general wouldn't help so much; air circulation would help a little
- simulate-me 5y agoAC would help because the air coming into the car would pass through an air filter.
- goodpoint 5y agoNo, the AC filter is in now way able to remove fine particulate in most cars from decades ago.
- systemvoltage 5y agoBtw, solder fumes are not lead, but flux.
- sjmm1989 5y agoGood to know. I've always wondered, cause I accidentally got a good whiff of it once and ... my cheeks were red for what felt like hours or a day. My memory of it is hazy. I've got ventilation going much stronger now.
- azinman2 5y agoIt’s not good to be inhaling flux either.
- krallja 5y agoGenerally speaking, if you can smell it, it’s not good for you to inhale.
- systemvoltage 5y agoBad advice. There are a lot of odorless volatile compounds that will kill you. Human olfactory sense evolved to smell food, waste or rot; it didn't evolve to detect synthetic and contemporary chemicals invented in last 100 years.
- krallja 5y agoFallacy of the Inverse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying_the_antecedent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying_the_antecedent
- systemvoltage 5y agoHow so? Care to elaborate? The only thing I am noticing that's left in my argument is that there are also bad chemicals that can be detected by human olfactory sense. My original point was that "Just because it has no smell, doesn't mean it is good for you", which is perfectly congruent and abdicates the fallacy you've listed.
- mutagen 5y agoI’m glad I wasn’t the only one!
- throwawaycities 5y agoMy Dad was born in 1934 and growing up he had toy kits that consisted of lead, a smelter and casts of the toys/figures. I can find these kinds of kits online from the 60’s but they all claim to be lead free. I wish I could find one of the original kits he had growing up.
- goodpoint 5y agoI'm shocked by yours and similar comments. Did you simply assume that flux are solder are healthy? (e.g. lead toxicity is well known since many centuries)
- walkhour 5y agoI'm guessing the health angle wasn't contemplated. Focusing on health wasn't that common before.