4 ms·
Let me counterexample where changing soldermask is good: In my experience, changing from Green Soldermask (everybody's default) generally gets you better solde
by bsder 4y ago
Let me counterexample where changing soldermask is good: In my experience, changing from Green Soldermask (everybody's default) generally gets you better soldermask coverage as they aren't trying to optimize usage to the micropenny.
If I want mega-cheap, green is good. If I want reliability, almost any other color is better.
- doug_life 4y agoI love seeing hardware posts on here. I often use colors other than green to differentiate revisions, however green typically has the smallest minimum web requirement which makes a difference on high density designs.
- bsder 4y agoHmmm, never thought about that. I don't think I've noticed a different minimum web requirement based on color for 0402-class and QFN stuff, but I could certainly believe it for extremely small footprints and high-density BGAs. Where I seem to see issues with green soldermask coverage are tented vias underneath components. The canonical example is a non-GND via underneath a QFN component with a pad. However, I have also seen issues with vias next to large pads of power transistors where the transistor can "float" around on the solder. This seems counterintuitive since I would expect the main soldermask color to be used for more BGA-type components where the breakout vias would need to be covered properly. Nevertheless, experience suggests otherwise. I finally got fed up once and ordered the same PCB with green soldermask for one batch and blue for another. The green ones had some via coverage fails; the blue ones didn't have any. Since then, I've just avoided green soldermask unless I'm going for uber-volume levels of PCBs.