I love soldering.
I hate soldering
161–170 of 244 posts
Re: I hate soldering
#162If you hate soldering, try weldng. Especially TIG with a rod. Pretty much anything is easy after that.
Re: I hate soldering
#163I had to click, because it turns out that I love soldering. It's relaxing and has a skill curve such that there's a trick to it but with a bit of practice, you can be someone who is really good at soldering, too. For anyone reading, the key is to invest in a proper stereo microscope and a decent fume extractor. I recommend this one: https://www.strangeparts.com/a-boy-and-his-microscope-a-love... If you're up for a bi…
It's over $1,000 to buy the products you mentioned. Kind of proves the article/poem right. If the trick is spending 4 figures, that's no trick.
The real trick is that it's a skill that you practice and get better at. I was able to do this
https://hackaday.io/project/197868-sub-surface-simon
using no magnification, and only cheap soldering tools.
You can and should be able to solder SMD with only an iron and tweezers. Not everything; not the smallest stuff, but you don't start there. My sweet spot is 0805 or 0603 size components and 1.27mm pitch SOIC parts, which I actually find easier to solder than through hole, because you never have to flip the board over.
My recommendations for most useful tools are a Pinecil, a few packs of cheap flush cutters from Amazon (even expensive ones get dull or break), a cheap pair of sharp tweezers [1], and a tube of flux [2]. You don't always need extra flux if using flux-core solder, but enough flux can turn even the crappiest solder joints into good ones.
Most of the rest of the skill comes from being able to brace your hands against things to get fine control, while being far enough away to not burn yourself.
Magnification unfortunately comes down to how good your eyes are. If you can see your fingerprints clearly at arm's length, your vision is already good enough. If not, no big deal, get a cheap microscope like this one first [3], or a loupe, or some strong reading glasses, or one of those headband visor things with lenses in them.
[1] https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/seeed-technology-...
[2] https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/chip-quik-inc/SMD...
Re: I hate soldering
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've used a couple of the ZD- ones and they are ok, but not very good quality. They don't really clog all that often, but they do fill up quickly and are very difficult and messy to clean out. They are also made of cheap plastic which will crack after a while exposed to the heat that it is. The tips for them are also low quality, and the solder will eventually dissolve them, making the hole in the middle of the tip l…
That was true for the older ZD-* models. The one I mentioned is in a different Ballpark (except you also meant specifically the ZD-8965). The hakko is way better quality but beneath the price (i have no idea where you got one Besides that the hakko is a good device. Too expensive for me though
My region has the Japan voltage version on Amazon for $210.
https://www.amazon.com/Hakko-FR-301-Desoldering-Tool/dp/B07B...
I think the one I had was the ZD-917, which I don't even think anyone makes anymore. Assuming the ZD-8965 made some material improvements, it looks like it has the same style of reservoir with the internal spring, which is one of the main issues I had with it. I found that the spring would become eventually become trapped inside a large solder blob, making cleaning difficult. Then, you have to line up the filter and keep everything together while reinstalling it. For whatever reason, the tolerancing on mine made this especially difficult, and I eventually broke the glass tube when trying to reinstall it (replaced with an aluminium tube). Hakko version has no internal spring, and has enough tolerance to easily remove the reservoir.
The rubber grommet on the front also eventually lost its grip around the small brass tube that comes out from the iron, so it would leak and not suck as hard. The hakko version presses its grommet against a flat plate instead, so that doesn't happen.
Still, both are much better than the "squeeze bulb" style desoldering iron I had before them.
Re: I hate soldering
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Everything is lead-free Leaded solder is easier to work with for personal projects. Careful hand washing and handling is required, but it's easy. I also recommend people go to surface mount, but I don't recommend beginners immediately go for expensive microscopes and reflow ovens. Stick to 0806 components or larger to start and you can populate a board without any binocular microscope or magnification as long as yo…
> Leaded solder is easier to work with for personal projects it really isn't if you use a nice modern lead-free solder. you'll need your iron to be about 20c hotter, but it's not like the early days of lead-free where it'd flow all weird.
I was extremely surprised when, out of solder recently, I just bought some Draper lead free solder from my local Home Depot(!), and it flowed so much better than my previous roll of fancy lead-free solder from a decade ago. Basically indistinguishable from leaded. I was very surprised.
Re: I hate soldering
#166I had to click, because it turns out that I love soldering. It's relaxing and has a skill curve such that there's a trick to it but with a bit of practice, you can be someone who is really good at soldering, too. For anyone reading, the key is to invest in a proper stereo microscope and a decent fume extractor. I recommend this one: https://www.strangeparts.com/a-boy-and-his-microscope-a-love... If you're up for a bi…
Starting with soldering, I find these 200$+ recommendations (regardless of which tool) hard to justify. # Soldering iron I'd recommend the Pinecil V2 with IronOS. https://github.com/Ralim/IronOS # Solder fume extraction I've built a simple fume extraction with an old plastic case, a 120mm fan and a sheet of carbon filter attached to a 120mm dryer / air conditioning hose. Around 15$ and good enough for soldering from…
>Desoldering Pump
I should have bought my Hakko fr301 way earlier than I did.
Re: I hate soldering
#167Earlier quoted context omitted.
I appreciate the enthusiasm, but I have given up. Maybe it will inspire another reader. I didn't write it to discourage others, but to underline that sometimes, defeat is OK to admit, rather than keep trying. I mean, a smell is temporary unpleasant but what happened to my health here? I am a former smoker, so I guess damage was previously done there. This specific iron is a portable one (I had it hooked up on a power…
> It was lead-free soldering tin with flux included. Flux core solder is crap. It doesn’t contain enough flux to begin with and since it’s inside the solder, it can’t actually do the work it’s supposed to. You need to apply flux separately before soldering, and lead-free solder used to be harder to work with. That’s the leading mistake I’ve seen frustrate beginners. Steady hands aren’t a requirement unless you’re doi…
>Steady hands aren’t a requirement unless you’re doing very complex repairs
I remember I was in college when I tried to solder some jump points on my xbox to enable me to mod it. I went in expecting electronics to look like what they did when I was growing up (I used to take everything apart, but I usually was able to put it back together). I open it up to find the jump points are smaller than grains of sand. It left me very much wanting some sort of mechanical aide to help. I occasionally watch videos of people repairing gpus or mbs and I cannot imagine how they do it.
Re: I hate soldering
#168I like it, simple through-hole stuff still but what is gross is when flux gets on my hands.
Re: I hate soldering
#169I had to click, because it turns out that I love soldering. It's relaxing and has a skill curve such that there's a trick to it but with a bit of practice, you can be someone who is really good at soldering, too. For anyone reading, the key is to invest in a proper stereo microscope and a decent fume extractor. I recommend this one: https://www.strangeparts.com/a-boy-and-his-microscope-a-love... If you're up for a bi…
> It's relaxing and has a skill curve such that there's a trick to it but with a bit of practice, you can be someone who is really good at soldering, too.
Over the last 30 years or so I have very (very) occasionaly soldered some basic stuff to build simple IoTs. Everytime this was (and is) a struggle (with a cheap equipment, no practice etc.)
And then someday I discovered on Youtube a video of someone resoldering some elements (chips, flat resistors, ...) using some kind of gel and a heat gun (?) and it was mermerizing. So clean, so fluid -- seriously a relaxing experience
Re: I hate soldering
#1701 mistake I see a lot of beginners make is, they bite more than what they can chew.
You can not suddenly be able to replace your PS5 HDMI port if you've never soldered before. Also you need the right tool, a $20 solder is never enough.
Soldering is a skill, you need to practice.