.:madworm:.'s photos with the keyword: paste

Mostly OK I guess, but I worry about the DFN10 footprint a bit.

About to undo the damage of too much solder paste.

Apparently I goofed up again. The footprint was a 0603 one, but even for that size it was rather small. The next revision comes with 0805 with wide pads for hand-soldering. So what do you do if the footprint is too small for 0805? You go looking for 0603 LEDs! And if you can't find any of those, you just use 0402 ones ;-) I had to use heavy magnification for this one. The LEDs are so light they easily stick to the tweezers if only the slightest amount of "finger-grease" is on them. It's a good thing I refrained from buying 0201s. They would've pushed me over the edge.

The simplest way works best.

Not recommended. Sucking sucks.

This one should (in theory - muahahahaha) survive longer. The piston and plunger are one part and the O-ring sits in a groove.

A cheap syringe. This one doesn't have the screw-on option for the tips, but the tapered 'thing' is the same. The tips will fit quite securely, IF the mating surfaces are clean.

The rubber seal didn't survive the repetitive pull-back of the plunger.

Now this stuff is GOOD. No smoke (at 285°C), stays on the PCB for quite a while, almost no smell at all. And it already comes with a nozzle. No need to buy another one as I did. The nozzle was horrendously overpriced at close to 2$. I totally agree with the verdict of the guys at dangerousprototypes. I did a quick test job (TQFP-32 7x7 package) and it just worked nicely. One 'helping' of flux was enough. I didn't have to constantly re-add flux like in case of the FL-88 dispenser pen.

This is what you have to deal with because mother nature didn't feel like giving you proper feet. Hearing grinding sounds coming from my knee doesn't make me a happy camper. We're NOT amused! --- Diagnosis (shortened): Bad news: 2nd to 3rd degree damage to the cartilage behind the kneecap + some sort of oedema + other minor stuff. Good news: No 'free particles' floating around and doing more damage.

and it smells too! Consistency is much like Nutella (chocolate spread), but I surely wouldn't want to eat that. At least I hope my knee will like it.

Anything is possible with good paste flux!

Very little solder paste for the resistor packs.

More paste.

Inspect the blobs. You don't need much.