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Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

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Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#121

Post by orangepurple »

InitialLastName wrote: post #53
orangepurple wrote: post #49

Soldering is good, BUT... You should avoid soldering when possible because connectors are detachable for module maintenance and solder is prone to cracking in high vibration environments. Typically you will see a connector soldered and otherwise secured mechanically to a PCB where vibrations are unavoidable. Crimping is better whenever feasible

This is probably true for scaled production, BUT... Most people following Instructables for tips on soldering wires to vector boards aren't likely to need to maintain their prototypes, and roughly 0% of those prototypes will be in a high-vibration environment.

Soldered connections can be surprisingly crap (intermittent electrical gremlins) especially if you're a noob. You can't easily spot a cold solder as a noob. Meanwhile even a noob can easily judge basic crimp quality. Better to get an all-in-one box assortment of cheap male and female connectors off eBay

I started out soldering but now it's mostly limited to installing connectors into PCBs followed by hot glue around the housing for mechanical rigidity

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#122

Post by orangepurple »

gw99 wrote: post #79
InitialLastName wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is probably true for scaled production, BUT... Most people following Instructables for tips on soldering wires to vector boards aren't likely to need to maintain their prototypes, and roughly 0% of those prototypes will be in a high-vibration environment.

Actually this crap will probably be bodged into a rats nest nightmare project if it’s an instructables user. Anyone who has debugged one of them knows to do things properly or suffer the wrath of intermittent problems.

And intermittent problems make newbies lose motivation extra quickly and care even less until they eventually rage quit. It's better to just get connections done well right away

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#123

Post by eternityforest »

I have done this stuff in production environments. Wires and connectors are like, 30% of the challenge on simple projects and can make or break the quality of a project.

You MAY have a chance if the wire is pretinned or you use flux. Do not do this with bare copper even if it looks like it works, you will probably get at least a few cold joints.

The better version is to coat the wire and pad with solder, put the wire on the pad, flux. then press it into the pad with the iron.

Better yet, never ever solder wire directly to a board in hobby or low volume work unless small size is totally critical. Especially stranded. It makes a metal fatigue point if things move at all, and requires hot glue to stand even a few bend cycles.

And even when you do have good connectors, it's probably still in your best interest to minimize the number of wires hanging around, learn about I2C as quick as you can.

It can't be quickly disconnected for repairs and replacement and troubleshooting.

It's a lot of work.

Even if done perfectly it's just not very nice.

Instead, solder connectors to the board directly. For short ranges use 2.54mm jumpers. Never use male jumpers if you can avoid it, they are delicate and annoying.

For longer distances, there are lots of things that don't suck, USB-C, 2.1mm barrel, Ethernet, 3 pin XLR, and whatever your country has for mains electricity.

Stay away from normal 4mn banana plugs unless you are in a field where they are already everywhere. The cheap ones shear off. and have bad connections and they are not particularly common. Even DMM test leads don't use them, they use the shielded versions.

Common off the shelf stuff that you can buy extensions for. Don't solder long wires to stuff, it will just make a tangled mess when you put it away and make it hard to troubleshoot.

When you do have a reason to do stuff like that, Wago connectors and pigtail adapters are your friend especially for tests and troubleshooting Because then when you realize you actually don't need 5 XT60 extensions, you can swap the ends for something else quickly.

And most importantly Do. Not. Invent. Some. Crazy scheme of powering all your projects from a central point over long 12v wires. Every new electronics DIYer seems to do it, and cables and wires are often the enemy. Yeah it looks cool and sci-fi and seems like a good idea to have wires everywhere, but single purpose and custom made cables are a nuisance to deal with, they're heavy and expensive and trip hazards.

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#124

Post by arcticbull »

sandreas wrote: post #20

Oh boy, nice idea, but this looks complicated and time consuming. I recommend to get some good equipment first: - solder fume extractor (see below) - extra thin high quality tin - a desoldering pump AND desoldering wire - high quality flux - a TS 100 soldering Iron with KU tip from ali express for 50 bucks - optional: USB-C Power Adapter for your existing power supply (so you don't have to buy one) - optional: a sold…

The TS100 is apparently not recommended for IronOS according to their README. Curious why you chose that one over, for instance, a recommended TS80P or better a Pinecil V2? Full disclosure: I have a 15 year old Weller WD1 so I don't know much about this.

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#125

Post by wolfendin »

gw99 wrote: post #73
bsder wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, every time I see a soldering "tutorial" that doesn't use separate flux--I facepalm. Flux is probably more important than the solder for good joints. A syringe of paste flux makes life ridiculously easier.

I did several years in production engineering. We never used flux. Not once. It’s a crutch for people who don’t know how to solder. What we did was use solder that wasn’t shitty. Big fan of felder 62/36/2 but it ain’t cheap. We also cleaned stuff properly before soldering it. The reason people tend to flux things to death is that they didn’t clean the oxide layer off before soldering. Or used shitty solder.

Yeah, I’ve been soldering for something on three decades now and the only time I need flux is removing parts on ancient boards.

More flux that what comes with the solder isn’t necessary with good technique.

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#126

Post by OJFord »

gw99 wrote: post #113
bitdivision wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

felder 62/36/2 [0] is a flux-cored solder. So you were using flux every time. It's also a leaded solder, which is much easier to get nice joints from than lead-free. Flux is great, adding some before you solder is a good tip, and will likely help you make better joints if as you said, you haven't perfectly cleaned everything. The only downside is perhaps some more cleanup afterwards. There's no reason to disparage it…

Yes it’s additional flux that you don’t need.

So flux is 'a crutch for people who don't know how to solder', because that knowledge would lead you to use 'expensive' flux-cored solder instead of 'shitty solder' plus flux?

I really don't think either's wrong, and anyway I assume 'production engineering' is not using how-to-solder tutorials.

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#127

Post by JKCalhoun »

duped wrote: post #16

This looks like a recipe for cold solder joints and solder bridges and doesn't seem like it saves time. What you really want to do when you have dozens of jumper wires is to do an array-of-struct to struct-of-array transform on the steps. Instead of cutting, stripping, tinning, and soldering one wire at a time, cut all your wires, then strip them all, then tin them all, then solder them one by one. Here's a pro tip:…

Another pro tip, get a better soldering iron than the one in the video.

Soldering stations aren't cheap (Hakko is my somewhat-budget-friendly favorite) but that (plus good solder) will make you realize you've been able to solder all along: it's just that you were using crappy tools.

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#128

Post by b112 »

mdturnerphys wrote: post #99
lagrange77 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are laser wire strippers? Shut up and take my money.

Here's the one I've used: https://www.laserwiresolutions.com/product/mercury-4/

This... how, why, what? It has to be fake. Right?

We're supposed to be using lasers to ... well, shoot at space ships, not cut plastic wire wrapping!!

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#129

Post by salmo »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #127
duped wrote: post #16

This looks like a recipe for cold solder joints and solder bridges and doesn't seem like it saves time. What you really want to do when you have dozens of jumper wires is to do an array-of-struct to struct-of-array transform on the steps. Instead of cutting, stripping, tinning, and soldering one wire at a time, cut all your wires, then strip them all, then tin them all, then solder them one by one. Here's a pro tip:…

Another pro tip, get a better soldering iron than the one in the video. Soldering stations aren't cheap (Hakko is my somewhat-budget-friendly favorite) but that (plus good solder) will make you realize you've been able to solder all along: it's just that you were using crappy tools.

A few years back I bought a Chinese hot air rework station for I never really use the hot air part but am in love with the iron. I can dial in the temp and avoid breathing fumes directly. It is so much nicer to use than my old Weller with a temp dial.

Re: Soldering Wires – Here's a different way

#130

Post by Zekio »

sottol wrote: post #33
sandreas wrote: post #20

Oh boy, nice idea, but this looks complicated and time consuming. I recommend to get some good equipment first: - solder fume extractor (see below) - extra thin high quality tin - a desoldering pump AND desoldering wire - high quality flux - a TS 100 soldering Iron with KU tip from ali express for 50 bucks - optional: USB-C Power Adapter for your existing power supply (so you don't have to buy one) - optional: a sold…

Or get a $25 Pinecil that comes with IronOS pre-installed and is by all accounts almost as good as the TS-100 [1] (it's $40 on Amazon now :/). I got one, was so impressed that I got another. One big upside over the TS-100 for me is that it can be driven by both a beefier USB-C (which I always have around anyway) and DC-plug PSU. Plus, it's running Risc-V, and they even sell an breakout to use the "logic board" as a R…

damn, you made me notice they've made a V2 of pinecil
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