The adoption rate would be better if you could buy a smaller roll of good lead-free. $70-100 for a pound of solder which is 10 lifetimes of a supply for any normal person. I have seen people sell cutoffs themselves but that’s harder to find.
The lead wire solder doesn’t absorb through your skin. You basically need to eat it. I suggest people don’t use leaded solder paste because it is small balls that can trap in your finger folders. Wire lead solder is really unlikely to transfer and wash hands to be extra sure
Do you have a source for this I can read? I do not see any papers that show typical solder temperatures are hot enough to vaporize. Not a material science person but normal soldering only has it above melting for a couple seconds and that is with tin mix. Not sure what mechanism would cause it.
My soldering game took a giant step up when I finally tossed my childhood pencil iron and bought a temperature controlled station. $100 gets a pretty decent one nowadays.
Get a decent soldering iron and more important: the right tip for the job! personally I really love the cut off conical ones made for SMD work and a fat flat one for thous rough high heat situations...
Comments
I refer people to this post by @electromage.bsky.social all the time: https://www.bhencke.com/blog/2019/3/15/a-hill-to-die-on
(I also work in the aerospace industry, where lead-free is a hard NO.)
https://ehs.mit.edu/wp-content/uploads/EHS-0167.pdf