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Lead-free solder wetting time is longer than, and flow inferior to, tin/lead solder. This will reduce throughput in production lines. Lead-free solders and their fluxes are more aggressive than tin/lead and so will reduce tip life, especially if soldering temperature is increased.

To overcome hand soldering problems with lead-free alloys, soldering iron manufacturers have introduced new products which have much better temperature control. These enable faster wetting, allow lower temperatures to be used increasing tip life, and allow wetting of difficult surfaces without the need to use more corrosive fluxes.

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