Share your Soldering Tips Here

[dingo1799]

electronics gauge like 22-26ga solder helps too... not the 10-12ga stuff u buy from walmart for $4 for 12"

heat the solder, not the work! less time the iron is on the wire/board/whatever you're soldering, the better off you are. as a general rule, electronics do NOT like heat.

 

[jrlp]

^Don't listen to that.

You always heat the work. You need the work hot enough that the flux in the solder etches and cleans the material being soldered. When it's hot enough, the solder will flow to it. All electronic components are designed to tolerate the heat of soldering. That's what they are made to do. Be soldered.

Electronics don't like someone holding a 45watt iron to them for 30 seconds to solder one 20 gauge wire. That's bad form. Of course electronics can handle the heat of soldering, that's how they are connected...

Getting the heat in and out as fast as possible is the proper way to solder. Always heat the work, and touch the solder to the item your soldering, not the iron. Although having a fresh shiny dot of solder on the iron helps heat transfer immensely.

Buying a bottle of rosin flux should be on everyone's list. A tiny dot has more flux than 1" of .060" solder, and even more of electronics grade .03* size. For plated/coated items, SOP is to add a small dot of flux and heat the area with an iron until the flux melts and flows. Once that's done, it can be tinned with solder, then wire attached. I recently soldered my vivi nova as well as a boge cartomizer. The pins/casings on both were chrome plated. As you know, it's nigh-impossible to solder to chrome. I brushed a small section with a SS brush to break up oxides, fluxed and heated, and the solder flowed instantly. Took less than 3 seconds with the iron to solder a 16 gauge wire.

Technique and experience is far more important than quality of tools. In college for electronics engineering, we were forced to build solder LADDERS out of .030" solder. Now that's FUN!

 

[Levins23]

thank you guys for all the help i have just made my first altoids mod and am gona try some of these techniques next time to get a clean job done. thanks again!

 

[Koman]

^Don't listen to that.

You always heat the work. You need the work hot enough that the flux in the solder etches and cleans the material being soldered. When it's hot enough, the solder will flow to it. All electronic components are designed to tolerate the heat of soldering. That's what they are made to do. Be soldered.

Electronics don't like someone holding a 45watt iron to them for 30 seconds to solder one 20 gauge wire. That's bad form. Of course electronics can handle the heat of soldering, that's how they are connected...

Getting the heat in and out as fast as possible is the proper way to solder. Always heat the work, and touch the solder to the item your soldering, not the iron. Although having a fresh shiny dot of solder on the iron helps heat transfer immensely.

Buying a bottle of rosin flux should be on everyone's list. A tiny dot has more flux than 1" of .060" solder, and even more of electronics grade .03* size. For plated/coated items, SOP is to add a small dot of flux and heat the area with an iron until the flux melts and flows. Once that's done, it can be tinned with solder, then wire attached. I recently soldered my vivi nova as well as a boge cartomizer. The pins/casings on both were chrome plated. As you know, it's nigh-impossible to solder to chrome. I brushed a small section with a SS brush to break up oxides, fluxed and heated, and the solder flowed instantly. Took less than 3 seconds with the iron to solder a 16 gauge wire.

Technique and experience is far more important than quality of tools. In college for electronics engineering, we were forced to build solder LADDERS out of .030" solder. Now that's FUN!

Didn't know that, thanks for the tip!

 

[DrSeuss]

Remember, it is heat not pressure which creates a good solder joint. Never press too hard. Secondly, always wait for your soldering iron to get good and hot before you start soldering, this minimises the time you apply heat to the solder joint.

Thirdly, soldering irons are hot, I have burnt myself numerous times on a soldering iron.

And finally, use a tip that is an appropriate size for the job in hand. Small tips for small things, big tips for big things. I was a hardware design engineer for 5yrs and recommend JBC soldering irons, for their quick change tips and super fast heat up cycles. Pricey but worth it, if you plan on doing a lot of soldering.

 

[bapgood]

I'm thinking about getting a new soldering station with hot air and looking at the X-Tronic 9020 4 in 1. Anybody have any experience with Z-Tronic or this station.

 

[varivapr]

what ever you are soldering should be hot enough to melt the solder. In theory you should almost be able to remove the iron and melt the solder to the component. The solder flows to where the heat is. If it is balling up and not sticking its either not clean, not hot or both. Hot and quick works best for me. Good luck. Practice and you will master it.


Also. A good solder connection should looks shiny not dull. If you wove the work as the solder is cooling it make turn a dulling color/tint on you. Thats a cold solder joint and should be fixed by removing and resoldering.

 

[philderbeest]

This is very very low tech but I use a diesel engine glow plug for soldering. It is modded somewhat (relay, microswitch etc) and resembles a tattoo gun. I will upload pictures when I get to my toolbox next. It's obviously 12V so you need to clip it on a vehicle battery but it gets extremely hot extremely quickly. I came up with it when trying to solder switches into vehicles when outside and it's windy/cold/raining.

 

[DrMA]

Everything you ever wanted to know about soldering:
HeliFreak - View Single Post - How to solder correctly (a not so brief lesson) Plus tips and more...

 

[StrappedKaos]

Also a tip if not already stated...
Pull soldier thru the item you are soldering to I.E. if you are tinning a wire put the iron on the opposite side of the wire and put the solder on the side opposite of the iron and it will "pull/suck? the solder thru the wire to get the best solder. Same with a item you are soldering use the iron to pull/suck solder into the area you are applying solder. def. helps when connecting wires, once you tin the wire and add another wire to connect you will see what I mean. Strapped

 

[Kyle Chamberlain]

I didn't feel like reading through all eleven pages but my Tip is...... When you go to solder something stick iron in wire sponge or wet done it towel to clean of the junk. Then tin the tip, then put a small amount of solder on the tip, like a small ball of solder on the side of tip your are going to be applying heat to object. Then apply heat through iron and inject or push solder into opposite side of heat source.make sure the parts or wires are fluxed. Don't use acid core flux solder. Use resin core solder preferably a lead tin solder. So basics, apply flux, clean iron tip, tin tip, apply heat, wait a tad, apply solder to opposite side of heat source, clean off flux residue.

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[Zanderist]

Just some tips;

• I've found from a US Navy manual from the 1950's you can reduce the heat coming off the soldering tip just by wrapping a coil of exposed copper wire and then stretch the rest to desired length and centered above existing tip. When I get access to the book again I will hopefully post exact details on this

• You can get some chore boy copper pot scrubber from a local super market. Just take an empty soda can, cut about a quarter way up from the bottom, place the pad in and then bend the edges in towards the center

 

[Zanderist]

As promised the picture title explains all.

 

[Anemephistus]

I did not see this listed, I'm new to the forum at this point but I've got a serious solder safety concern that I suggest is taken into account when doing work on an e-cig. If at any point air (or anything else you will be inhaling/ingesting) goes across where you have done soldering work espessialy if it gets hot, use lead free solder. Most electronics solders use lead. It works really well. But if the circuit/wires/whatever have intake air going across them, especially if they are hot, it could be really bad.

Most designs have the air supply holes in locations that this would not matter...but I'm a diy kind of guy and figure a few layouts might not account for this.

The worst part is that it could take years before the symptoms of the problem would become apparent.

 

[DrBeaker]

You need a good clean iron and I recomend .032 or .031 60/40 rosin core 1/16 or smaller tip on your iron.
use a wet sponge clean the tip with a quick wipe then tin or load the iron seconds before you attempt to solder something. Do this each time. Soldering is a wet operation. I mean wet with molten solder. Molten solder conducts the heat quickly so your done fast.
dont keep the iron on your connection long. It should only take a second or two.
there should be solder on the tip and you should be touching the joint with the solder with the other hand at the same time.
the molten solder will follow the heat. Drag the tip the direction you want it to flow.
do not blow on the cooling joint. That will make a cold joint and it will frost and be weak and fail!
I hope that helps...
Clean
clean
clean

 

[MonkeyTokes]

As others have said, tin the tip and wire/component you're soldering. Keeping the tip clean with a bit of sandpaper (move fast) or a sanding wheel on a dremel works great for me, the little sponge things work as well but not as good, though I go through tips fast sanding them every few minutes. Tinning the tip keeps the tip from oxidizing as much which is good, and makes solder flow much smoother and faster which is imperative when working with things like mosfets and switches that can only take so much heat. Really thin solder has also done wonders for me. Its surprising how much better my mods look since ive started to use really thin solder.

 

[K3nn0Q]

Get a brass "sponge" for cleaning the hot tip before soldering a joint. Looks a bit like steel wool and won't cool the tip as much as a normal wet sponge or paper towel.
Sanding should only be done on a heavily oxidized tip, while cold, and very lightly!

 

[Spider Pig]

I use a 60/40 lead content for all my jobs. It flows much easier and I'm not very concerned with the lead vapor even if there is any. I build boards for OEM manufacturers and we only use lead free when shipping over seas. They need to have gold pads to accept the solder better. The wells stations are by far the best. at least for me!

60/40 Is the only way to go. I have been using pb based solder for years as well and It bonds best has the best flexibility and cools quickly. Get a decent hot iron and thats about all you need. Tinning tips is a great technique as well as roughing a surface with sandpaper. If you are really concerned about the PB in the solder fumes, you can always get a solder screen that absorbs the smoke

 

[Wheelin247]

Keep some flux on hand. This stuff really helps me sometimes. Keep your iron clean. I use my rotary tool on it. Not a dremel but a black and decker that uses all the dremel accessories.

I know this thread hasn't been active in a while but I've been making my own mods for a couple months and my Lowes el cheapo soldering iron wasn't making it easy to solder so I got a temp control soldering iron and loving it so far. I have a question about flux. I have a tube of white water soluble flux I got with the Lowes iron kit and have been using that. Being in a tube it was a bit difficult so I ordered a can of flux off eBay and I tried to use it today and I couldn't get the solder to stick to the copper (14g solid wire), I use the tube and it sticks. I don't know much about flux but why wouldn't the solder stick after using one but will stick with the other?

I noticed there is multiple kinds of flux. What kind of flux should I be using for soldering mods? So far I've just been making unregulated series and parallel mods but I want to try my hand at regulated and PWM mods and I want to get the right kind of flux that will make it easier for me to make a good solder joint. I'm going to be getting some multi-stranded wire in a couple different gauges. I want to make sure I get the right kind of solder before I get into the other mods where I'm doing a lot of soldering to circuit boards.


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[Wheelin247]

I second that, nerf, that brass tip cleaner is the best thing I've discovered my entire soldering life. Since using one of those, I haven't had to file down the soldering tip to get fresh copper exposed. My tips last forever now. I swipe the brass and immediately tin with rosin core solder every time I pick up the iron, even if it has only been a few minutes. Sounds like a hassle, but once it's routine, you won't even notice doing it. And it sure beats having to file the tip and replace it every month or two.

The only thing I flux is nichrome and stainless (and copper plumbing pipes). The acid in the flux will eventually corrode the metal and you are forced to use baking soda to neutralize it and then you have to rinse that off. Too much hassle, unless you have to.

How do you get rid of the solder that has been wiped onto the brass shavings sponge? Are you even able to or do you just get replacement brass shaving sponges every so often?


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