RoHS Compliance

[ken]

I see your point about those '$29 cheap CD players'. We as a culture have become so addicted to having the newest, best and the most of everything that product lifespans are nowhere near as long as possible.

Take computers, for example... the computer I'm using right now has a sticker in the corner that says 'Designed for Windows '98' on it. For me, this is still a good computer because as long as it runs, I can get software and I can still surf the Web with it, I'll keep it. For others, it's last year's model and junk. I'm fascinated by the shrinking time a computer has once it comes out until it's superseded. Once it was years between new generations, but now it's about nine months or so. Soon, it won't just seem like your computer is obsolete before you bring it home, it will actually be that way.

All those underutilized computers, ipods, DVD players, etc. have to go somewhere, and China is the biggest buyer of scrapmetals on the planet. I have seen some of the photos of the piles of dead consumer goods and heard stories about the environmental byproducts of their own style of reclaiming materials from these goods.

We as musical instrument manufacturers are not only an almost immeasurably small fraction of the total wastestream, but IMHO every one of us designs and builds their products to last much more than ten years or so. We don't design our products to go into a $149 'Christmas gift' box with a guitar and amp made in Hostilistan. I think the problem is that those in authority had a problem to fix, and they did it. Unfortunately, they didn't seem to bother to differentiate between the amount of lead in a huge pile of cheap DVD players and that in a very very small pile of pickups. For them, lead is lead. For us, it's a very big deal.

Am I going to go to the RoHS standard? Eventually, I'll have to, just like everyone else. Market forces will see to that, I'm sure. But right now, it seems just a bit like the RoHS committee are very much overcompensating
for a problem that was overlooked for a long time.

Ken

(an English translation is available - email me at pickups@angeltone.com for details)

[Mark Hammer]

Very cogent comments. RoHS is a good solution to a very big problem. I live near a place that recycles computers, and when you see the 10ft high shrink-wrapped pallets of cast-off 15" monitors bound for the dump, and multiply it by the tens of thousands of similar pallets world-wide, you start to wonder if it will be legal to sell or eat fish in 20 years' time, given the anticipated contaminants drifting into the food chain. Hell, for that matter, you can expect to be charged for every bag of waste you leave curb-side given how far that waste will have to be transported just to get to the far side of the city dump. The age of buying municipally-issued stickers to put on each bag of garbage ain't that far off folks, largely BECAUSE of all the cast-off technology left for the garbage-man that sits there and NEVER biodegrades.

Of course, if you use the sort of sledge hammer intended to drive in railroad spikes for tapping a finishing nail into place to hang a picture, chances are you will crush your finger and put a hole through the wall in the process. Manufacturers of small-scale goods intended to be long-life need a different sort of tool to address what could be a best practice in their own businesses. I don't know a lot about RoHS, but I suspect that in its current form it does not provide such a tool.

[ken]

I try to be cogent if I can, but after being awake for eighteen or twenty hours at a stretch (like I was on Wednesday) the ability leaves rapidly.

I try to use 'old tech' as much as humanly possible, and I try to recycle as much as I can. My computers on the average are six years old, and I shop at rummage and estate sales for tools and computer parts. The interesting thing is that you don't need a new computer to run your biz if you don't need it. Most computers up to five or so years old or so are great for running a small business. I run my shop on $150 worth of old Apple Power Macs. I have a older nice HP printer for printing box labels and pamphlets, but the rest is all 'recycled' stuff I got from local college students. I bought a nice three year old Compaq laptop and Visual Basic 6 from a guy last year for experimenting with making a computer controlled winder 'just like Wolfe's' for only $50. Think about it.

I'm no granny glasses wearin' granola smokin' hippie either... just really cheap.

/snip
Hell, for that matter, you can expect to be charged for every bag of waste you leave curb-side given how far that waste will have to be transported just to get to the far side of the city dump.

Don't laugh... the city I live in is facing a 'garbage bag tax' and 'Garbage Nazis' right now. The city wants to tax us per month to throw our trash away, and charge us on our property tax bill to do it. We are no longer allowed to toss out furniture (even wood), non foodcan metals such as car parts, piles of newspapers can only weigh ten pounds or so each, etc. Computers and other WEEE stuff is right out. If Arlo Guthrie wrote 'Alice's Restaurant' about current events around here, he probably would have been shot first... and then made to pick up the garbage. I live in central WI too, not Los Angeles or NYC either.

I agree totally about the heavyhanded approach on RoHS, it sounds like a 'election year' sort of deal. You know... 'Quick, we have to do something to justify our existence to the voters... lead is bad, so let's ban lead!' For RoHS/WEEE to work, there has to be some mechanism for people like us who use lead for 'purely artistic' reasons. If you read my last post, maybe it is possible to convince the RoHS committee that we are actually selling upgrades to extend the lifetime of an instrument and keep it out of the trash. After all, the RoHS website DID say that 'any parts designed to be used to extend a product's life is considered to have a positive environmental impact, so modification of a product to enhance its function and therefore extend its life are excluded' from RoHS.

I take this to say that since we actually DO make parts designed to 'enhance its (a musical instrument's) function and therefore extend its life', we shoud be excluded from RoHS. Is there any way to prove this to the RoHS committee?

Ken

[Just Bob]

Best to stay informed about this. Even though RoHS is not a currently a requirement in the US, you can bet it will be. The EPA can make these sort of regulations very quickly and quietly. They banned oil-based paints in counties that had air-quality problems. I could just pop over to the next county and get paint and thinner. Earlier this year, I went to get some more. Not a can on the shelf anywhere. I never saw a word about it on the news, but they enacted a state-wide ban on oil-based paints. You can only buy it in quart cans now. Soon it will be banned entirely. Urethanes and oil varnishes and stains too.

There are some counties here where you can't buy cheap imported equipment. They enacted regulations banning the sale of any electrical equipment that isn't UL approved. A new machinery store opened up with lathes and mills and stuff. The county came in and told them they couldn't sell them. A whole section of the store is blocked off with yellow tape. "Not for sale". The people who run the store had no idea about this when they opened.

I really doubt there will be much in the way of RoHS exceptions. Almost everybody can justify an exception somehow. The exceptions will quickly outnumber the rules and make them impossible to enforce. Most everything wears out and gets trashed eventually. You can't just push the problem a decade or two into the future. It will eventually crop up again. I think some of the rules are extreme but we better start getting used to them.

[Stan H]

So, how long ya think before people start seeking that Pre-RoHS tone?

~Stan

[Alex/Tubewonder]

So, how long ya think before people start seeking that Pre-RoHS tone?

~Stan

Don't worry, somebody will put out a modelling amp claiming it nails it.
With lead gone, heavy metal sound will be harder to get

[ken]

No it won't... it will be replaced with bismuth, or maybe depleted uranium

Ken

[Luijo]

Will this ban include Led Zeppelin?

[ken]

Ol' Robert will finally end up unleded.

Ken

[ken]

RoHS soldered circuits shorting out with age????

Seriously, anyone who cares about the long term effects of RoHS compliance may want to read this next part. I got this from one of ampage's own advertisers...

/snip
Although alternate high-performance materials are quickly being developed, Sn is still the most widely used Pb-replacement metal. It is known to grow "whiskers", or filamentary corrosion, which can eventually short out the electronics. This could cause catastrophic problems in high-reliability, long-life applications such as satellite systems, medical implants, military weapons, and heavy equipment.

Other pure metal and alloy substitues, such as Ag, Cu, Zn, Bi, In, Sb and Cd, are also potential causes of failure for electronic equipment if not used properly. These substitute materials must be developed, tested and monitored as quickly as possible to meet high-performance demands.


Ken

[JGundry]

I tried the Kester #257 on some 42AWG plain enamel I was using for humbuckers today. I was pleasantly surprised by how well it worked. I had no problem with blobbing and was able to get in and out quickly. I didn't' have to use liquid flux. I just tinned the pigtail first and always made sure the tip was clean and hot enough. I'm not going to sweat it unless coils start failing. I was in and out so quickly I doubt there was a problem of too much heat. Just make sure you use a wash free flux to avoid failures.

[Stan H]

I tried the Kester #257 on some 42AWG plain enamel I was using for humbuckers today. I was pleasantly surprised by how well it worked. I had no problem with blobbing and was able to get in and out quickly. I didn't' have to use liquid flux. I just tinned the pigtail first and always made sure the tip was clean and hot enough. I'm not going to sweat it unless coils start failing. I was in and out so quickly I doubt there was a problem of too much heat. Just make sure you use a wash free flux to avoid failures.

Did you mean Kester #275?

[JGundry]

Sorry, yes #275.

Two dyslexics walk into a bra.

[leftywinder]

RoHs is a bunch of bull crap.

One of my first hobbys was making fishing lures of lead, did this for a number of years, then got a letter from one of the mold makers here in US, saying EPA was going to ban lead fishing sinkers/lures. The reason was that shotgunners in the US were poisioning ducks, which would eat a few of the pellets, and die of lead poisioning. Turns out they only wanted to ban the making of home-made lures weighing more than 1 oz., this way they could ban the making of bullets. Pure political bull s__t. This proposal was defeated by the efforts of the NRA. As far as using lead solder goes, you just need good ventilation, I have melted and hand poured sinkers for many years with no ill effects, have been tested for blood lead levels and found to be well below toxic effect levels. This is just pure crap.

[David Schwab]

I think the issue is toxic materials ending up in land fills, not so much for the worker.

Lead in the environment is a big issue for infants and children more than for adults. When my son was about 1 his doctor found higher than normal lead levels in his blood, and a whole scan of our house had to be done. Even though we had no peeling paint, there was lead based paint under many layers of non lead paint that had to be removed.

They never did figure out where the lead in his system was coming from, but removing the paint from the wood work in the house and repainting seem to do the trick.

I'd think shotgun pellets cause more lead in the environment than solder... but the NRA is just evil.