Thanks for taking the time to post this info John!!!
73, Barry N1EU
On Wed, Mar 30, 2016 at 12:35 AM, John Henry <jshenry1963@gmail.com> wrote:
> eBay Dragon balls, all I can say is buyer beware.
> If you plan on buying any dragonballs on eBay to keep your
> Orion running down the road, you had better buy 20 of them.
> Almost all of the spare dragonballs on the market now have
> oxidation on the BGAs. This means that they won't flow well and
> have all of the balls, even by the best CM houses in the country.
> You can have them reballed, but, that only works so well as well.
> At TT we bought nearly 200 of them, the last that were from the
> floor sweepings, rejects from the factories, etc.
> Had them all reballed, and had a yield less than 20% that worked.
> And, guess what, almost all from eBay turned out to be worse.
> Then, once you do get a good dragonball, and you have a really good house
> remove them, well, just pray that the pads don't lift up from the CPU
> board.
> THEN, pray a second time that ALL of the newly reballed balls flow and
> connect.
> 9 times out of 10, it won't work the first time, then, when you pull
> that dragon ball off that can't be reused now, well, if a pad or two aren't
> removed, then pray the 2nd reflow of another reballed dragon ball works.
> Guys/Gals, to be blunt, these parts are over 15 years old now, and
> unless they were kept in a clean room, they will be oxidized to some
> extent. Some of the balls may be ok, but most likely, there will be a few
> that aren't, and those will not make contact when reflowed.
> If you want to buy them, go ahead, but I consider it a huge waste of money.
> You wouldn't believe how many sources we tried, how many eBayers, how
> many final stocking houses, etc. And out of maybe 500 purchased, there
> were only 100 that left the doors fully tested. The rest ended up in the
> scrap bin because there were some that simply would not run even in
> a jig, and some that needed reballed, and some where the reballing process
> killed the chip, etc. etc.
>
> jmho, just my two cents, for whatever it is worth.
>
> 73, KI4JPL
> John Henry
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