Well, if you have a soldering iron and some quality desoldering braid or a solder sucker, it shouldn't be more than a minute's work to clear them out. I suspect maybe their solder paste application pattern didn't mask the plated-through-holes properly ... but then again, maybe it's something which is different depending on who manufactured the Pi 3 A+ and which batch it came from.
I am sure I could do this - BUT it is a manufacturing fault which should be rectified.
The lead free solder used on modern boards is more difficult to deal with - maybe I should replace my 40 year old soldering station, but I shouldn't have to.
I am sure I could do this - BUT it is a manufacturing fault which should be rectified.
The lead free solder used on modern boards is more difficult to deal with - maybe I should replace my 40 year old soldering station, but I shouldn't have to.
I just received a Pi 3 A+ from Element14 and have similar issues. My first problem was that the board was shipped in a padded envelope which offers no protection and the thin RPi box was squashed. That caused me to do a close inspection and I noticed that someone had done rework on the board and did a very poor job. There were slivers of solder left on the board and apparently it was not cleaned after rework. I had the same problem with the pads being filled which isn't a big deal for me, but on real close inspection it looks like it had issues with the PTH soldering at the GPIO connector - like the solder temperature was not correct. Even if this board were to function I would worry about infant mortality. I am going to see if Element14 will replace this board. Very disappointed in the manufacturing quality.
