 | | From: | lily | | Subject: | Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | 15 Jan 2005 10:30:00 -0600 |
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 | "Fortune has an article about how the recent environmental push to
completely eliminate lead from electronic components and wiring may
eventually lead to the next Y2K problem of slowly-growing tin
whiskers short-circuiting equipment."
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Posted at:
www.GroupSrv.com
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| | From: | Mark Thorson | | Subject: | Re: Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | Sat, 15 Jan 2005 16:48:22 GMT |
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| lily wrote:
> "Fortune has an article about how the recent environmental
> push to completely eliminate lead from electronic components
> and wiring may eventually lead to the next Y2K problem of
> slowly-growing tin whiskers short-circuiting equipment."
Doubtful. Tin whiskers only grow from pure tin.
If you were using pure tin, you would also be subject
to tin pest, which would be at least as bad a problem
in Japan, Korea, Europe, and the northern USA.
Lead-free solders are unlikely to be pure tin, although
they may be tin alloys (which are not subect to tin
whiskers or tin pest).
Pure tin might be used as a plating on leads and
circuit board lands, but these phenomena are well
known in the electronics industry. Only idiots would
get bitten by them, however that can't be entirely
ruled out. The Illiac-IV supercomputer was plagued
by unreliable connections caused by plating gold
directly over copper without a barrier layer. That
was also a well-known problem in the electronics
industry, but somehow idiots were allowed to
participate in the Illiac-IV hardware design.
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| | From: | Al | | Subject: | Re: Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | Sat, 15 Jan 2005 17:29:14 GMT |
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| In article <41E94978.AD2B710@sonic.net>,
Mark Thorson wrote:
> lily wrote:
>
> > "Fortune has an article about how the recent environmental
> > push to completely eliminate lead from electronic components
> > and wiring may eventually lead to the next Y2K problem of
> > slowly-growing tin whiskers short-circuiting equipment."
>
> Doubtful. Tin whiskers only grow from pure tin.
> If you were using pure tin, you would also be subject
> to tin pest, which would be at least as bad a problem
> in Japan, Korea, Europe, and the northern USA.
> Lead-free solders are unlikely to be pure tin, although
> they may be tin alloys (which are not subect to tin
> whiskers or tin pest).
>
No. I've seen many failures in electronics caused by tin whiskers.
All it takes is a little humidity and a voltage potential between
two points and boy do the whiskers grow.
Al
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| | From: | metalengr at hotmail.com | | Subject: | Re: Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | 17 Jan 2005 11:29:10 -0800 |
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lily wrote:
> "Fortune has an article about how the recent environmental push to
> completely eliminate lead from electronic components and wiring may
> eventually lead to the next Y2K problem of slowly-growing tin
> whiskers short-circuiting equipment."
>
> *-----------------------*
> Posted at:
> www.GroupSrv.com
> *-----------------------*
The well-known whisker problem is more general than just tin. Zinc and
silver coatings also can grow whiskers.
Zinc whiskers (from electroplating on steel floor tiles for raised
floors) are a possible problem in data centers.
See the recent article at:
http://nepp.nasa.gov/whisker/reference/tech_papers/2004-Brusse-Zn-whisker-IT-Pro.pdf
and of course also check the home page at:
http://nepp.nasa.gov/whisker/
Pittsburgh Pete
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| | From: | Uncle Al | | Subject: | Re: Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | Sat, 15 Jan 2005 19:25:56 -0800 |
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| lily wrote:
>
> "Fortune has an article about how the recent environmental push to
> completely eliminate lead from electronic components and wiring may
> eventually lead to the next Y2K problem of slowly-growing tin
> whiskers short-circuiting equipment."
Usenet's cloaca,
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> Posted at:
> www.GroupSrv.com
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Screw the Enviro-whiners. Now everthing still works and it's still
inexpensive. Enviro-whiner's trinity: Expensive, shoddy, deadly.
"Shoddy" was the first recycled wool. Guess what it means today.
--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
(Toxic URL! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/qz.pdf
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| | From: | lairetam88 | | Subject: | re:Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | 15 Jan 2005 14:30:49 -0600 |
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| The rapid minaturization of electronic components and lead-free
legislations worldwide have the electronics industry revisiting the
60-year old tin whisker problem. Amongst the most visible fiasco of
tin whisker are:
- NASA has a prohition order on pure tin plate.
- FDA issue recalled on pace-maker
- Failure of satellites
For link to the article and discussions
Click
Here
Also for SEM phot gallary
Photo
Also [url=http://www.materialsforum.net/bbs/viewforum.php?f=3]Visit
Here[/url]
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Posted at:
www.GroupSrv.com
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| | From: | MK | | Subject: | Re: re:Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem | | Date: | Wed, 19 Jan 2005 09:03:21 GMT |
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| More info on tin whiskers at these sites
http://materialsforum.net/bbs/viewtopic.php?t=354
http://nepp.nasa.gov/whisker/photos/index.html
http://www.inemi.org/cms/projects/ese/tin_whisker.html
http://materialsforum.net/bbs/viewtopic.php?t=357
"lairetam88" wrote in message
news:41e97d79$1_2@Usenet.com...
> The rapid minaturization of electronic components and lead-free
> legislations worldwide have the electronics industry revisiting the
> 60-year old tin whisker problem. Amongst the most visible fiasco of
> tin whisker are:
> - NASA has a prohition order on pure tin plate.
> - FDA issue recalled on pace-maker
> - Failure of satellites
>
> For link to the article and discussions
> Click
> Here
>
> Also for SEM phot gallary
> Photo
>
> Also [url=http://www.materialsforum.net/bbs/viewforum.php?f=3]Visit
> Here[/url]
>
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> Posted at:
> www.GroupSrv.com
> *-----------------------*
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