[TowerTalk] metal whiskers

[Jim Lux]

And Finally,  I have not seen any reports of problems with amateur radio
> equipment in regard to this problem.  If anyone has anything specific,
> a citation would be a good thing to post.
>
> Best regards(and slow growing whiskers)
> N2EA
> jimjarvis at ieee.org

I suspect that instances of this in amateur equipment might be attributed to
other failure causes (ESD, mechanical damage, overvoltage, "unauthorized
tinkering", etc.).  Most ham gear isn't high value enough to justify a
rigorous failure analysis. You'd just figure out what's broken, replace it,
and declare it fixed.  The standard repair/cleaning process might move the
whiskers around enough to solve the problem.

Same thing applies to PCs.. I'm sure that some intermittent type failures in
PCs have been attributed to things like "crummy motherboard" or "crummy
memory", when in actuality, it was something like tin whiskers.  Again, the
value isn't high enough for anyone to actually even look for it.  You just
scrap the mobo and install a new one.