The art of soldering

gstuart · Jul 25, 2019

Nodge68 said:
That's interesting. Mine is definitely calibrated using the buttons. Yours even says cal in the box between the buttons, as does mine.
Maybe the software is different between yours and mine, although can't think why.

There's a video on YouTube about calibration of these solder stations. I'll see if I can find it.

Mine is the same inside, but I only checked the ground wires for integrity, and didn't pay attention to the adjustments on the board. Helping hands are useful, I've a couple of sets, one with the magnifying glass, one without.

Cheers , that’s what i also thought a knew u would be more up to speed than myself concerning these so,daring workstations

Thks as I haven’t been able to find a U tube video as of yet and indeed seems strange how it’s different

Just dug out my old heating bag where I’ve got my meters , forgot I had some of them

Think the K thermometer will be ideal as there’s 2 x different probes, one for surface temp and the other for air temp so can test the hot air gun as well

See what u think plse , if u also think that will be the best one to use

Many thks

gstuart · Jul 25, 2019

Nodge68 said:
Here you go. Big Clive played with a similar solder station, and worked out the calibration. Mine calibrated in the exact same way is this, even though the station is a different design. Presumably the software is the same on all these cheap solder stations.

Perfect and many thks,

Think I started watching some of his videos , when u mentioned his name the other day , sounds Scottish and has a beard

Nodge68 · Jul 25, 2019

gstuart said:
Cheers , that’s what i also thought a knew u would be more up to speed than myself concerning these so,daring workstations

Thks as I haven’t been able to find a U tube video as of yet and indeed seems strange how it’s different

Just dug out my old heating bag where I’ve got my meters , forgot I had some of them

Think the K thermometer will be ideal as there’s 2 x different probes, one for surface temp and the other for air temp so can test the hot air gun as well

See what u think plse , if u also think that will be the best one to use

Many thks

View attachment 185276 View attachment 185277 View attachment 185278

You want to use a low mass (small) thermo couple, or the iron won't be able to maintain temperature.

gstuart said:
Perfect and many thks,

Think I started watching some of his videos , when u mentioned his name the other day , sounds Scottish and has a beard

He is Scottish (Glaswegian) and very good to watch, oh yes he has a large beard too.

gstuart · Jul 25, 2019

Nodge68 said:
You want to use a low mass (small) thermo couple, or the iron won't be able to maintain temperature.

He is Scottish (Glaswegian) and very good to watch, oh yes he has a large beard too.

Many thks

Sorry to sound dim, do u mean using the black handled prob instead of the large crocodile clip because that will take some heat away from the soldering iron when measuring temperature

Ref , 2nd pic, Have got some smaller K probs but the ends would just melt

Plus would it be best to use the green K thermometer meter plse

Thks again

Hippo · Jul 26, 2019

Nodge68 said:
No contest between them. Leaded solder is miles better at flowing into the parent metal, and is less fussy on what the metal is.

Lead free solder doesn't flow well, and gives a much shorter life than leaded, hence millions of tonnes of electronic equipment going to landfill, which wouldn't happen if leaded solder had been used.

Industry doesn't care if the product made goes to landfill sooner than it would have done if proper leaded solder had been used.

I disagree. We do care in industry. The myths around lead or not were an initial concern but soon disappeared. Moving to flow solder was a far bigger problem but we got over that anorl.

Hippo · Jul 26, 2019

gstuart said:
Hi buddy

Can only comment on heating when it comes to leaded and lead free solder , massive difference with how they run inside fittings , personally found the lead free to be horrible

Alas don’t know when it comes to soldering as I’ve not used leaded solder before but would assume the leaded will run better

Indeed ordered some leaded solder with the flux inside

Plumber soldering with a gas torch is different as the heat applied is uncontrollable and to an extent indescriminate.

There's loads of peeps who would have once popped oft ter Maplin (rip) and bought a £20 antex iron which self regulates temp and got on ok soldering with or without lead. All yer need ter do is tin the wire and terminal. While the terminal is still warm solder both together. The terminal will draw away a lot of the heat so you will need a iron tip which looks more like a flat screw driver end as opposed to long and pointy, to make it easier for yerself. That type of tip will deliver the flow of heat yer need to the end of it. Something the pointy type suffer with as yer use it and the heat dissipates.

Colthebrummie · Jul 26, 2019

Blimey! Soldering has moved on a lot whilst my back was turned. I started my working life in the electronics industry where being able to solder heat sensitive components was a necessary skill. All we had was a standard soldering iron, 25 watt I think. I have three irons, a little one, a big one and one with a pointy tip, it's all I've ever needed and never had a problem until I suffered a bit of nerve damage and now struggle to hold the iron at all, let alone steady. What's going on with all this hi tech soldering station nonsense? It's gadget owning for the sake of it.

Col

Nodge68 · Jul 26, 2019

gstuart said:
Ref , 2nd pic, Have got some smaller K probs but the ends would just melt

Plus would it be best to use the green K thermometer meter

Use this thermo couple

And whatever meter that shows the temperature with reasonable accuracy.

discool · Jul 26, 2019

Colthebrummie said:
Blimey! What's going on with all this hi tech soldering station nonsense? It's gadget owning for the sake of it.

Col

Agree and so do the engineers that we employ, all they want is something to melt the solder to affect a repair, the small gas item is their preference, as their not into manufacturing circuit boards with iCs etc any faulty boards found are simply replaced, unless is something obviously simple like a burnt out resistor in a PSU.

My own collection of irons are 18w Antex, 25w Solon for a bit of extra heat outdoors and a 65w Solon which is great for radiator repairs and back in the good old days battery lugs, some where theres a soldering iron that I heated up on the gas stove, I built a few car alarms using that.

gstuart · Jul 26, 2019

discool said:
Agree and so do the engineers that we employ, all they want is something to melt the solder to affect a repair, the small gas item is their preference, as their not into manufacturing circuit boards with iCs etc any faulty boards found are simply replaced, unless is something obviously simple like a burnt out resistor in a PSU.

My own collection of irons are 18w Antex, 25w Solon for a bit of extra heat outdoors and a 65w Solon which is great for radiator repairs and back in the good old days battery lugs, some where theres a soldering iron that I heated up on the gas stove, I built a few car alarms using that.

Blimey that takes me back, as a kid we useto have a coal 3 x leg burner in the kitchen , my dad would put a soldering iron on top of it to heat it up

gstuart · Aug 4, 2019

@Nodge68

Hi buddy

Well I tested the temperature of the soldering iron

Set the soldering iron to 200c , used a clamp and probe

Wow, At the end of the day the soldering iron is minus 110 c out of calibration

Will have to see which one of those screws I need to adjust

Know u said to test it and blimey was u right , seeing how far it’s out

Have got the other probe that will test the air temperature for the hot air gun

Just surprised it was that far out , thks also for the heads up to test it and so pleased u did ,

when ive been using the soldering iron I had set it to 300 c so in reality was only 190c

Plus got sent some leaded solder and flux, ( from Narpy , D3 forum , is an air craft engineer ,so like urself knows what he’s talking about ) , results are night and day , massive difference as I got a few pieces of wire and tried my leaded and unleaded solder so could really test them , considerably e the

Thk so much once again and very grateful to ur goodself

This is the reading using the clamp

Probe being used

Differential temperature between the clamp and prob

Clamp and probe on the soldering iron

Technical details from the book

gstuart · Aug 4, 2019

Calibrated it and also used the K thermocouple which was more accurate , as u also mentioned

So this is what I’m at , soldering iron was set on 200 so got the calibration I feel as close as I’m going to get

A lot better than what it was before

Thks again

Colthebrummie · Aug 5, 2019

What did you use to test your digital thermometer? You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble if you had bought an ordinary soldering iron from Screwfix for about a tenner.

Col

gstuart · Aug 5, 2019

Colthebrummie said:
What did you use to test your digital thermometer? You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble if you had bought an ordinary soldering iron from Screwfix for about a tenner.

Col

Hiya

Funny enough all my meters are calibrated , get them done every year

Originally my hot air gun went and had an old cheap soldering iron, because I mainly used my hot air gun for heatshrink I thought it would save money by buying them together in one unit

Only took an hour to calibrate so didn’t really bother me

Would be interesting to see how accurate my old soldering iron is , lol

Nodge68 · Aug 9, 2019

Colthebrummie said:
You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble if you had bought an ordinary soldering iron from Screwfix for about a tenner

Those are toys. Although would have worked in this case.

gstuart · Aug 9, 2019

Nodge68 said:
Those are toys. Although would have worked in this case.

Hi mate

See u were spot on ref calibration, couldn’t believe it was out my minus 110c

Thks so much once again for all the help

Nodge68 · Aug 10, 2019

gstuart said:
Thks so much once again for all the help

Glad to help Gary.

The art of soldering

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