aluminum is a nice enough metal but it's a pain to work with
can't solder to it worth crap without special solder and really aggressive flux, can't weld it without tons of practice
-F
but it's cheap, relatively strong (even stronger with small amounts of copper and other metals in it--most stuff sold as aluminum is actually an alloy), lightweight, has excellent thermal and electrical conductivity (not as good as copper but still really good, and cheaper)
it's just a pain to work with
-F
@Felthry I like aluminum.
Definitely not great electrically tho. And the oxide layer is a mixed blessing.
@Felthry welding it isn't so bad if you have a good TIG welder.
@starkatt soldering it's a nightmare though. you need incredibly aggressive flux, and a weird zinc-based solder that has the potential to give off highly toxic zinc fumes (tin-based solders, even really good tin-lead stuff, just don't wet aluminum very well at all)
-F
@starkatt and that aggressive flux means you need to be absolutely sure you've cleaned off every last bit of flux residue or your board is toast
-F
@starkatt i don't think the zinc fumes are really that likely to happen but anything working with zinc and high temperatures you need to be careful
-F
@Felthry yeah zinc freaks me out.
@Felthry it's why galvanized steel is my nemesis.
@starkatt I imagine welding it is a lot more dangerous than soldering with it, due to the higher temperatures involved!
-F
oh and it makes terrible crimped connections because you can't break through the oxide very well
and it's really hard to wirebond to
-F