Homebrew PCBs

On Wed, 23 Apr 2008, DJ Delorie wrote:

Hmmm...

> been sitting on my bench for over a year and half now, in sporadic
> use, and still works like when I got it.  Puddles when warmed, though,
> so unless you've got a precise mask (i.e. no excess paste) there's not
> a lot of point in being too careful.

Perhaps that's the tradeoff - the less puddly solder pastes have short
shelf lifes and need refrigeration (and are probably designed more for the
factory), and the solvents in the stuff they sell in syringes are assumed
to be used in prototyping, so small amounts and sporadically - so are
forumlated for long life at the expense of other properties?

I did notice the Edsyn stuff puddling a bit where there was a lot of
paste, but then again, doing hand assembly without a stencil I'm drawing a
line with the stuff anyway. But I'm a true believer in solder paste now,
it was so much faster and easier than drag soldering (especially the big
square chips).