I’m joining the split keyboard group by building a piantor. I have the pcbs already and they’re lead free coated and I will use lead free solder on the components.

I’m a bit worried though as I used a borrowed split and I noticed I keep touching the soldering in the microcontroller quite a bit and the build I was going for was a bare one where we just put rubber feet directly in the pcb so there’s no case or anything.

I tend to rub my eyes and bite my nails quite a bit during the day. I was wondering if it’s safe enough on lead free solder or if this is something I should completely avoid.

Any suggestions in case I should avoid it entirely. I reckon the worst place would be the top of the pcb maybe I can use some hot glue where the solder is but I have no idea if it’s hard to pull it off later if I need to review/resolder.

This is my first project and I haven’t done anything like this before, so even the flux I’m kind of unaware how to clean, solder comes with it right, do I need to wipe it somehow or use isopropyl alcohol and wipe with maybe a paper towel?

Sorry about being a complete noob. I searched around but most people are concerned about the lead solder not lead free like me.

    • Inevitable Waffles [Ohio]@midwest.socialEnglish
      2·
      4 months ago

      Lot of good points here. I work in electronics manufacturing so I’ll add on a bit. Yes, much of what has been explained about solder and flux is correct. I will caution about trying something like conformal coating a board in this setting. It is hard to work through and can beat up your iron. Lead free is great but sucks for working it into the joints. It just doesn’t heatt the same. Even IPC build standards have explicit instructions about visual inspections of non leaded joints looking like shit.

      If you are planning to coat the board, I would do outdoors as well. Extraction fans are great for general soldering but we use fume hoods for conformal coat. Just something to keep in mind.