During PCB assembly some residues may remain, such as flux on the surface of your PCB after wave soldering, reflow soldering or manual soldering. Those pollutants that are created during the assembly process may lead to potential safety hazards to the PCB. As a result, most industries consider cleaning their PCBs to be mandatory, so long as they don’t contaminate or break the board being cleaned.
When cleaning a PCB, we need to focus on the protection of important electrical components, especially fiber optics receivers.
Here are four important notes for cleaning boards which include the HFBR-2522Z Fiber Optics Receiver from Broadcom.
1. Preventing contamination of the part
During PCB assembly and cleaning process, the optical port plug must be left in port to prevent contamination of the port.
2. Completely dry
After PCB cleaning with solvent, the optical components must be allowed to dry completely before first use.
3. Recommended chemicals for Cleaning/Degreasing HFBR-2522Z
Alcohols: methyl, isopropyl, isobutyl.
Aliphatics: hexane, heptane.
Other: soap solution, naphtha.
Do not use partially halogenated hydrocarbons such as 1,1.1 trichloroethane, ketones such as MEK, acetone, chloroform, ethyl acetate, methylene dichloride, phenol, methylene chloride, or N-methylpyrolldone. Also, Broadcom does not recommend the use of cleaners that use halogenated hydrocarbons because of their potential environmental harm.
4. Cleaning/Degreasing Solution
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Solution 1：Cleaning with recommended chemical solvents
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Solution 2：DI (de-ionized) water can be used as an alternative. Rinse the parts with DI water followed by a drying cycle. Be sure to remove any excess moisture and properly dry the parts. You can perform drying in appropriate drying equipment.
Please note that the drying parameter time/temperature depend on the process conditions, board layout, drying equipment and so on.