Phil Zarrow, ITM Consulting With over 35 years experience in PCB assembly, Phil is one of the leading experts in SMT process failure analysis. He has vast experience in SMT equipment, materials and processes.
Jim Hall, ITM Consulting A Lean Six-Sigma Master Blackbelt, Jim has a wealth of knowledge in soldering, thermal technology, equipment and process basics. He is a pioneer in the science of reflow.
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I have used many types of gloves within my job as a QA engineer/auditor as you typically wear whatever the site stocks. Well, I recently used gloves at a manufacturer that were wonderful. Cloth with rubber tips (I am sure more costly). Cloth...slippery, and sometimes transfer oils from the manufacturing site or body. Rubber...sweaty and can be too sticky and uncomfortable. Combined...marvelous, I wore them all day and was wishing I would have asked for a pair!! For what it's worth.
Les Beller, Echostar, USA
Actually, I prefer to handle the boards by the edges. I've used gloves for stenciling - they seem to work best for me, but that's more of a health/safety issue to keep the paste off my hands.
But when loading & unloading the pick&place and oven, I've found that cotton gloves snag on board edges and rubber cots or gloves don't give good traction. In other words, if I were using gloves/cots I would probably be dropping a lot of boards. Just my 2-cents from actually running the equipment for many hours/days at a time.
I guess I also question how proper handling by edges could cause solderability issues on pads??? Seems to me good practice is good practice. Just wearing gloves isn't an improvement if they get dirty and you don't realize it.
Patrick Muldoon, JPD Controls, Inc
When you recommend gloves, it reminds me of a study I did years ago where we noticed that eventually after a few hours use, human oils were saturating the cotton gloves and causing more defects than no gloves at all.
Cots, on the other hand don't allow oil to penetrate to the boards. So, if your going to recommend gloves, make sure they are not cotton, or change them frequently.
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Les Beller, Echostar, USA
But when loading & unloading the pick&place and oven, I've found that cotton gloves snag on board edges and rubber cots or gloves don't give good traction. In other words, if I were using gloves/cots I would probably be dropping a lot of boards. Just my 2-cents from actually running the equipment for many hours/days at a time.
I guess I also question how proper handling by edges could cause solderability issues on pads??? Seems to me good practice is good practice. Just wearing gloves isn't an improvement if they get dirty and you don't realize it.
Patrick Muldoon, JPD Controls, Inc
Cots, on the other hand don't allow oil to penetrate to the boards. So, if your going to recommend gloves, make sure they are not cotton, or change them frequently.
Gerry Cooper, Teledyne Printed Circuit Technology