Hughes OKs Sales of Ozone-Safe Solder Flux : Agreement: New product will allow phaseout of CFCs. Litton Industries will be the sole manufacturer.

An environmentally friendly solder flux generating tremendous excitement in the manufacturing world has been licensed for general sale by Hughes Aircraft Co., the giant aerospace company said Wednesday.

The agreement allows a division of Litton Industries to be the sole U.S. manufacturer and distributor of the material, which can significantly reduce the use of ozone-damaging chlorofluorocarbons by industry. The material is made from lemon juice instead of rosin.

The licensing agreement comes three years after invention of the product by a Hughes engineer and almost a year after Hughes first announced its existence. A Hughes spokesman said the announcement in January drew more than 5,000 inquiries from companies around the world interested in obtaining information about the solder flux, called HF1189.

Flux is a material that removes a microscopically thin layer from metal pieces that are being soldered together, ensuring a solid join that is free from oxidation.

Rosin-based fluxes must be cleaned with solvents that use chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and volatile organic compounds. CFCs have been found to be a major cause of damage to the Earth’s ozone layer, while volatile organic compounds are pollutants that help cause smog. The lemon juice-based HF1189 can be cleaned with water or solvents that don’t contain pollutants.

Almost 20% of the CFCs used each year are in solvents used to clean solder flux from circuit boards and other electronic components during the manufacturing process. The compounds will be banned from industrial use worldwide by 1995 under an international agreement, the Montreal Protocol, that was signed in 1987.

Hughes officials said the company spent about $1 million developing HF1189--part of a $20-million investment in products and processes to phase out CFC use.

Litton’s Kester Solder Division in Des Plaines, Ill., will be the U.S. distributor under the licensing agreement, which was signed in September but not announced until Wednesday to give Kester time to produce sufficient product to begin filling orders immediately, Hughes spokesman Dan Reeder said.

Hughes and Kester developed the flux initially for the military electronics market.

Erick Slezak, Kester’s vice president for marketing, said sales to the military could total as much as $5 million a year. And because the product has broad commercial applications, he said, it could claim a large portion of a market worth several hundred million dollars a year.

Kester describes itself as one of the world’s three largest solder manufacturers.