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ROHS solder, aka lead-free solder, is more difficult to work with so "worse", sure, but on the flip side you don't inhale lead fumes which accumulate in your bo
by hnbad 2y ago
ROHS solder, aka lead-free solder, is more difficult to work with so "worse", sure, but on the flip side you don't inhale lead fumes which accumulate in your body (i.e. will never leave your body) and have the delayed effect of causing lead poisoning which can do anything from making you stupider to literally killing you. I'd say the good outweighs the bad here and maybe leaded solder shouldn't be sold to amateurs who don't work in labs under vents.
I'm not sure what you're arguing for. Keep selling products that disable and kill people until the technology improves and the market selects for the superior product? Because history has demonstrated that that rarely works out as long as the option that kills and disables people is cheap enough to outweigh the immediate drawbacks. Especially when consumers think they're immune.
- alpaca128 2y ago> lead-free solder, is more difficult to work with This kind of statement always puzzles me. Leaded solder was an absolute nightmare to use for me, after the switch to the lead-free one I was suddenly much better at soldering within minutes. It was like going from square to round wheels.
- hnbad 2y agoI haven't had the (dis)pleasure of working with leaded solder myself so I'm going by anecdotes but lead-free solder seems to have a higher melting point so presumably it's easier to damage components through overheating when working with lead-free solder than leaded solder. Either way, my point is that regardless of whether there are benefits, they're not worth dying for (or suffering from lead poisoning).
- m463 2y agoI was arguing for making things better (at the expense of some good solutions) The people that complain are correct. For example, asbestos IS a good technical solution! But it is worse in the big picture, therefore we need another solution that might not be perfect.