Flux cleaner

Grainger49 said:
I use the Isopropyl alcohol wipes I get with my syringes.

That sounds simple enough. I saw some stuff on Amazon that I thought would be good, but I want to make sure it's safe to use on a board.
 
I use grain alcohol purchased from the ABC store. I was trained to solder in a NASA 40 hour course  in 1972  and that is what they used. It smells good and if you are so inclined you can have a sip.
 
butchbass said:
I use grain alcohol purchased from the ABC store. I was trained to solder in a NASA 40 hour course  in 1972  and that is what they used. It smells good and if you are so inclined you can have a sip.

I did some training myself with all kinds of alcohol when I was younger............. ::)
 
"Turns out that there weren't as many redundant systems in the Space Shuttle as we thought. We were just seeing double."
 
I've always used 99.9% isopropyl alcohol, not to be confused with the grain alcohol suggested earlier.  Do NOT drink isopropyl alcohol, you'll likely end up in the ER.  Not that I haven't landed in the ER after drinking ethyl(grain) alcohol before..

I don't know about a bottle of Everclear or a mason jar of granpda's medicine but isopropyl in liberal amounts rubbed over the messy area with something like a q-tip or kim wipe is perfectly safe for your boards.  If it's a particularly bad mess or dirty board you can also get anti-static brushes on Amazon, but for something like the speedball you probably don't need that.  Isopropyl typically does the job very well and quickly evaporates.

This is what I use:
http://www.amazon.com/MG-Chemicals-Isopropyl-Alcohol-Cleaner/dp/B008UH4AI8/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1432191635&sr=8-5
 
For those of us who are diabetic, and get alcohol wipes along with syringes, they work well too.  They are also great for rubbing out touch ups on your car.
 
My take on this is that you really shouldn't need to clean flux off the boards we sell. I'd suggest trying a different brand of solder if you have excess flux on the board. And maybe practice on getting just enough, and not too much, solder on the pads. A smaller tip might help too.
 
Yeah for all of the BH soldering I have done so far I don't believe I've ever needed to clean the flux.  Usually when I need to clean flux it's for a chip or something where I had to apply some flux to make it easier.
 
My gripe with cleaning flux is that you have to get absolutely all of it off, otherwise it leaves a sticky residue that looks kinda nasty. 
 
It may be a tongue in cheek type of thing, but some of the de-soldering braid that I use leaves a real mess. In that case, I will resort to acitone.
 
I've found that too as there is some flux in the stuff.  IPA all the way for me, but as PB pointed out it can leave a sticky trail so usually i have to clean boards twice to get it 100%.

Also worth mentioning that the flux crud can be slightly conductive and cause havoc on sensitive circuits, thats a good reason alone to clean it off.  It also tends to turn black with heat inside a tube amp.

 
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