Re: gEDA-user: Surface mounted circuits in hobby projects

[Dylan Smith <dyls@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, 2 Apr 2009, Duncan Drennan wrote:

> > How do you handle this problem? Or is it a problem?
>
> If you choose your SMD chips carefully then SMD parts are not a
> problem. If possible choose devices with larger pitches (1.27mm over
> 0.65mm).

I've found 0.4mm to be my practical limit for using a soldering iron
(recently, an LQFP-80 with 0.4mm pitch). It goes much easier with a
syringe of solder paste - I've found the Edsyn CR44 (IIRC) is a paste that
has a good shelf life and doesn't need special treatment.

Things like SOIC are really easy to do with a soldering iron. 0.5mm gets
tricky and 0.4mm is about three times as hard as 0.5mm (from both the
perspective of managing to etch a board with 8/8 rules reliably, and
solder the chip to it). I've found for discrete components, 0604 is just
about the right tradeoff of size to hand solderability. (Again, solder
paste and hot air makes it easier).



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