In this video I go back to the beginning of my more than 45 years of experience soldering and buy a $15.88 Chinese soldering iron from my local Walmart store and compare it to a Weller PES51 pencil iron connected to my WESD51 soldering station and a Hakko FM-2027 connected to my FM-203.
I have said that you can use the cheapest soldering iron to solder SMD devices like SOIC-8s and QFP-32s. In subsequent videos I will attempt to solder pin headers, a DS1307 real time clock in a SOIC-8 package and a LGT8F328P MCU in a QFP-32 package.
The goal of these videos is to make clear that even beginners can solder modern SMD devices using basic soldering equipment that is readily available locally to most people.
Hakko FM-2023 station with MF2027 handle and T15-D16 tip
Weller WESD51 with PES51 handle and ETA tip
Workpro CA310 (Hangzhou Greatstar Industrial GS-30W)
Unknown Chinese solder
Haha, I love this. My first iron was some POS from a wood burning kit that barely got hot enough to heat leaded solder. I went through two more no-temp-control Amazon specials after that one, which lasted a surprisingly long time, but then I swapped to the “expensive” Amazon special - a temp-controlled rework station! Which worked for a few years, but still wasn’t great. I finally said screw it and bought a nice temp-controlled Weller station, and not two months later, found someone dumping a Metcal station. And I gotta say. The metcal is leagues above anything I have ever used - it’s insane. Heats up within 5 seconds of turning on. Seems like some models similar to mine can be had used on eBay for about the price of my new Weller iron - and I would’ve gone for that option had I known about it. Only bummer is the replacement parts come at a premium, of course.
Thanks. Is your Metcal an RF station? I’ve got a friend who has an RF station who says the same things. Almost instant heat, very stable.
Yup…I just looked it up. Thermal Mass RF. Very nice. That’s a big boy soldering station.
What kinds of things are you working on? Post pictures!
I’ll take some pics when I get back home next week! If I’m being totally honest, most of right now is just desoldering things. I reuse most of my circuitry components from salvaged boards, and also salvage the large majority of my perf boards. But I did “recreate” an HP 35 power supply a few weeks back that I can try to take some pics of!
Cool.