3 ms·

Anybody have tips on how to get to this level of solder-fu?

tsomctl 6y ago
Flux, practice, flux, good tools, flux, good lighting, flux. Really, learning how to braze and weld steel helped me a lot. Heat control is extremely important. Heat flows, and you learn how to position your iron to get the heat where you need it. You can also tell how hot something is by how the puddle looks.
inamberclad 6y ago
Heat control. Cleanliness. High quality tools and solder.
- buescher 6y ago
  Temperature control is so inexpensive these days you should not bother with heat control. Unless by heat control you mean the right size tip for the job, in which case we agree.
  - inamberclad 6y ago
    I meant in a more general sense, both temperature and heat flux.
    - buescher 6y ago
      Not for you, but for those that might not get the point: the world of electronics assembly is really strange - it's like the whole past is present with us. It's 2021 and you can still buy a Weller soldering station with a knob for open-loop power (= heat) control for more than you'll pay for a cheapish station with closed-loop temperature control from any number of Chinese brands. (google "Hakko 936 clone"), Closed-loop temperature control is much superior to open-loop power control.
DanBC 6y ago
Basic soldering is easy to improve with practice. A couple of hours with a few hundred assorted components and some scrap PCBs will help to perfect the steps (tin the bit, hold the bit to the joint, apply the solder, pull the solder wire away, pull the bit away, inspect the joint). Things are a little bit trickier today because the alloy of the solder and the flux you use do make a difference, but lead-free solder today is very good. Then practice with PVC insulated wire. The PVC insulation shrinks if it gets hot so this is good practice at speeding up. I looked through the NASA document and most of it is not advance technique. EDIT: people are saying "good tools" and I wanted to say a bit more about that. You can buy an iron for a few dollars from ebay. Don't use those. But almost any iron above that is going to be fine. I'd prefer to always be using Weller or Hako, but failing that any of the chinese no-name irons with temperature control are going to be good enough for most hobbyist projects. I love my Lindstrom and Bahco snips, but you can get good-enough cutters much cheaper. If this is something you're going to be doing all day every day you'll want to invest in the tools.
- buescher 6y ago
  I wouldn't give up my Metcal for anything else I've seen, but if I were broke, I'd buy one of the Chinese Hakko clones and eventually replace the tips with Hakko tips.
- function_seven 6y ago
  > Basic soldering is easy to improve with practice If you're looking for a practical way to do this, consider hand-wiring your own keyboard. I did this a couple years back, with 75 keys or so. With the diodes on each key, it was about 225 solder joints plus whatever extra to land the matrix leads on the microcontroller. Good variety, too. Some were wire-to-wire joints, others were wire wrapped around post, and a few where through-hole joints. If I look at the underside of that keyboard, I can tell where I started and where I finished by how clean the solder joints look :)
xxs 6y ago
T12 and flux, 37/63 solder, brass tip cleaner, flush cutter for through hole. Plus practice and more flux.
mcshicks 6y ago
I found these videos from eevblog extremely helpful when I setup my home lab after working as an EE for many years but never really learning to solder. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Sb21qbpEQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Sb21qbpEQ

Flux, practice, flux, good tools, flux, good lighting, flux. Really, learning how to braze and weld steel helped me a lot. Heat control is extremely important. Heat flows, and you learn how to position your iron to get the heat where you need it. You can also tell how hot something is by how the puddle looks.

inamberclad 6y ago

Heat control. Cleanliness. High quality tools and solder.

buescher 6y ago
Temperature control is so inexpensive these days you should not bother with heat control. Unless by heat control you mean the right size tip for the job, in which case we agree.
- inamberclad 6y ago
  I meant in a more general sense, both temperature and heat flux.
  - buescher 6y ago
    Not for you, but for those that might not get the point: the world of electronics assembly is really strange - it's like the whole past is present with us. It's 2021 and you can still buy a Weller soldering station with a knob for open-loop power (= heat) control for more than you'll pay for a cheapish station with closed-loop temperature control from any number of Chinese brands. (google "Hakko 936 clone"), Closed-loop temperature control is much superior to open-loop power control.

DanBC 6y ago

Basic soldering is easy to improve with practice. A couple of hours with a few hundred assorted components and some scrap PCBs will help to perfect the steps (tin the bit, hold the bit to the joint, apply the solder, pull the solder wire away, pull the bit away, inspect the joint). Things are a little bit trickier today because the alloy of the solder and the flux you use do make a difference, but lead-free solder today is very good. Then practice with PVC insulated wire. The PVC insulation shrinks if it gets hot so this is good practice at speeding up. I looked through the NASA document and most of it is not advance technique. EDIT: people are saying "good tools" and I wanted to say a bit more about that. You can buy an iron for a few dollars from ebay. Don't use those. But almost any iron above that is going to be fine. I'd prefer to always be using Weller or Hako, but failing that any of the chinese no-name irons with temperature control are going to be good enough for most hobbyist projects. I love my Lindstrom and Bahco snips, but you can get good-enough cutters much cheaper. If this is something you're going to be doing all day every day you'll want to invest in the tools.

buescher 6y ago
I wouldn't give up my Metcal for anything else I've seen, but if I were broke, I'd buy one of the Chinese Hakko clones and eventually replace the tips with Hakko tips.
function_seven 6y ago
> Basic soldering is easy to improve with practice If you're looking for a practical way to do this, consider hand-wiring your own keyboard. I did this a couple years back, with 75 keys or so. With the diodes on each key, it was about 225 solder joints plus whatever extra to land the matrix leads on the microcontroller. Good variety, too. Some were wire-to-wire joints, others were wire wrapped around post, and a few where through-hole joints. If I look at the underside of that keyboard, I can tell where I started and where I finished by how clean the solder joints look :)

xxs 6y ago

T12 and flux, 37/63 solder, brass tip cleaner, flush cutter for through hole. Plus practice and more flux.

mcshicks 6y ago

I found these videos from eevblog extremely helpful when I setup my home lab after working as an EE for many years but never really learning to solder. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Sb21qbpEQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Sb21qbpEQ