Green is most easily removed by water. WD-40 leaves a varnish like film when dry. Not really good for contacts. There are more products leaving a film when dry. Bullfrog makes a range of cleaners and evaporative film anti corrosion inhibitors. A molecular layer of material is deposited on metal to prevent corrosion. Many switches come with the piece of paper with an evaporative product.
greg
I can't say about its use on circuit boards, but my experience using WD-40 is that it causes RUST. I donno what it is about WD-40, i've long speculated it displaced other oil, then slowly evaporated over months leaving the metal unprotected. I never knew "WD" meant "water displacer". Rust always seems to follow months after using WD-40, coating with other oil only seems to delay the rust. I've thrown every can of it away. This stuff is crap.
Diesel makes an ok solvent and leaves a film. I'd rather use that if it works.
Stinks too. My cellar smells of kerosene and diesel which my furnace uses.
There was some caveats to using WD-40. I got some info from a seemingly reliable source. There was speculation to having some silicone oil in there and some problems with aircraft wings. This is on my cleaner page.
Thus spake Charlie+:
What do you mean by "Whatever you do I would advise you against soaking a board in anything for a few days, imo that would be asking for trouble!"?
I'll tell you how I would call it. I have boards made, and they wash them with water for a short period, then they blow dry them. They set out and dry. If it was soaked in water for a few day's, I think that would spell real trouble. These boards didn't work anyway, so they had to be baked after the short washings. Water might very well get sucked into the layers and take a long time to dry unless baked. Other solvents may very well start to dissolve stuff.
greg
Thus spake GregS:
This is a *long* term project. I'll be letting the boards sit in the sun for days at a time (inside). Any soaking they get will be followed by more than sufficient drying times.
Thanks,
On Wed, 26 Apr 2006 14:57:54 -0700, DaveC wrote as underneath my scribble :
Youll just do whatever you think, so why bother asking out for any advice in the first place! Your choices dont show much sense. Good luck with it. Charlie+
Unless the board has delaminated, the interior layers are darn near hermetically sealed in the laminating process. It is very unlikely that anything like coffee could penetrate a properly-built board. But, it sure can play hob with the outer layers, especially when the power is on. Connectors are also easy for liquids to wick into. I'd disconnect all the connectors, and some may be the flex-cable type that just presses a flex-print cable against the board, and clean anything there that needs cleaning. If glop got into the hard drive (usually under the keyboard!) that will likely be toast. The fans (if any) may have been glopped up, causing the delayed failure. Just tear it apart (it isn't working any more, anyway) and look for obvious problems. Gentle cleaning with alcohol and an old toothbrush, followed by a day of open-air drying should fix most fixable problems. Conductive glop getting between fine connections can pop chips, so it may not be salvageable. But, worth a try.
Jon
Thus spake Charlie+:
*Of course* I'll do what I think best. So would you.I ask questions here to gather information. I learn. I try to benefit from others' experience and (sometimes) mistakes. This "gauntlet" of possibilities "aims" my decision.
But in the end, of course, the decision is mine. And that choice will be different from yours.
You just proved his point, Dave. Why ask him if you admit from the start that in the end your choices will be different from his...
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