LONDON -- A survey conducted by the SMART Group during its annual Lead-Free Seminar in February found the majority of respondents will either not be ready or are uncertain about meeting requirements by the compliance date. Also, a large number of companies believe they are exempt from the RoHS Directive. The top challenges to being noncompliant by July 1 were noted as: lack of availability of Pb-free components, compliance issues, cost of stock to support spares, reliability, moisture sensitive devices, rework and repair.


About 160 attendees came for the technical sessions and exhibits.

Among the highlights:

• Abigail Cottrell, a specialist in eco-design and product policy at the U.K. Department of Trade & Industry, provided updates on materials that must are banned after July 1, the agreed exemptions and those pending, and told of an informal network of EU RoHS enforcement bodies to ensure a uniform EU approach. She advised that by July 1 electronics producers should be certain that self-declarations are in line and documentation is up to date. Don’t rely on pending exemptions, she said.
• Steve Brown, global product manager, wave chemistry, Cookson Electronics, talked about patent-protected Pb-free alloys and impacts on users. The paper, "Complying With International Patent Obligations," covered IP considerations, Pb-free alloy patents and typical costs of royalty payments.
• Steve Dowds, global product manager, Multicore solder products (Henkel), presented on behalf of the IPC Solder Product Value Council, whose goal was to reduce the confusion regarding alloy choice and is devoted to achieving a worldwide consensus on the issue. Dowds' paper, "IPC-SPVC: Comparison of SAC Solder Compositions," reviewed SAC alloys tested (SnAg3.0Cu0.5, SnAg3.8Cu0.7, SnAg4.0Cu0.5), with the former the recommended "commodity alloy" for Pb-free applications. Other conclusions: Standard FR-4 laminate can be used, and voiding (at least in this study) had no impact on reliability.
• Neil Stanton, BSI Product Services, summarized that companies should establish policy and processing, communicate with suppliers, find evidence and keep on file, use only suppliers in wich they have confidence, test where appropriate, communicate with customers, review process frequently and keep up-to-date with new RoHS information.

Other papers asserted that RoHS is as much an issue of logistics as it is technical, and looked at wave soldering practices.