Buying Solder Paste? 7 Things Every PCB Manufacturer Should Know Before Ordering
That reel of solder paste looked perfect on the spec sheet. Then it failed reflow testing — and now half your panel is heading for rework. Sound familiar? It should. This is the moment most PCB manufacturers finally admit solder paste isn't a commodity you buy on price alone. It's a variable — one that quietly decides whether your boards clear inspection or come back stamped for rework. Nobody puts that on the quotation. Here's the uncomfortable part: most defects don't trace back to bad equipment or sloppy operators. They trace back to paste nobody bothered to interrogate before it hit the stencil. Wrong particle size for the pitch. Flux activity that's already fading. Storage history nobody asked about. Buying solder paste without checking these three things is how good SMT lines still produce bad joints. This guide breaks down what actually matters before you place that next order. Particle Size, Not Alloy, Is What Breaks Fine-Pitch Printing Solder paste isn...