Temperature controlled soldering station - can I be helped?

[jonescg]

So I have been soldering up the balance taps of my 20s battery, putting them all into a D-sub 25.

It's fair to say this is one of those tasks you do when you are feeling at your best, cause it's a really fiddly task otherwise. One thing I am finding is that my 25 W iron struggles to wet properly so the soldering is often messy and difficult. Coupled with the fact that there's barely enough room to swing a cat, let alone avoiding soldering live wires together.

I was wondering, would a temperature controlled soldering station improve my soldering here? Or would it simply be an expensive addition to my shed with no appreciable improvement? Is there some way I can reinvigorate the tip of the iron so it does take some solder? Can I just get a new tip for it?

 

[bigmoose]

A good temperature controlled solder station works wonders. I have a Metcal SP200 and by changing tips, I can solder ultrafine surface mounts, to Audio turret boards.

Most importantly, if the tip won't take solder you are in a world of hurt. Even with the solder station, I always "park" the tip with a big blob of solder on it to protect the iron coating of the tip. If you let it oxidize and you loose the iron coating over the copper all bets are off. If you file the tip or abrade it with silicon carbide sandpaper you remove the iron protection coating and get into a vicious oxidation cycle. Don't even try to make the joint if your tip is not shining brightly with a solder tinning. When my tips won't take or hold a tin well they are binned.

It sounds like you are in need of a new tip for starters. Also I keep 2 or three varieties of flux in a hypodermic bottles. I am rather liberal with my liquid flux. It also does wonders.

 

[amberwolf]

Even a crappy temp-controlled station can work really well if you get used to which settings work on what things. (kinda like welding).

I have a station that was probably $30 when new, and likely not worth even half that, a Velleman VTSS5
http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a-store/item/IR-50/TEMPERATURE-CONTROLLED-SOLDER-STATION-50W/1.html
and it has worked well enough for me. It's main failings are that it's LED light to tell me it's on went out very early on, and on higher settings (the brighter red last two zones on the knob) the heat causes the threaded-on tip retainer to be loose and lets the tip wiggle around a little when you put pressure on it, and makes it transfer heat less well to large things. But nothing else has failed nor impeded my workflow in the several years I've had it, and I use it a lot.

I forget it's actual max wattage, but it's probably 40-50W at least.

Oh, and it's not a temperature controlled station, really, just an adjustable-power one. But it works way better than just a fixed-wattage pencil iron for many uses.

BTW, since I am both cheap and haven't enough $$ to buy new tips all the time, I sometimes sand or file down an untinnable tip and retin it immediately, and it will keep going for a while. The really cheap ones that are only plated with tinnable material (like radioshack irons) won't work for this, but all of the "good" brand-name ones I have had (weller, velleman, hakko, and i forget the ohters) have been solid tinnable material.

 

[GMUseless]

I've had this for about five years and love it: http://www.amazon.com/Weller-WES51-Analog-Soldering-Station/dp/B000BRC2XU/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1351604883&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=weller+soldering+station+analog

Weller WES51. It's served me well for everything from building analog synthesizers and ebikes, to sensitive TV and motherboard repair.

It's relatively cheap, but reliable. Heats up within a minute, and has an LED that shows the PWM heater control letting you know when its up to temp and when it's sturggling to get back to temp. It's got enough power to easily solder 4 and 6 mm bullets, yet can be turned down for sensitive IC's and diodes. I think it's 60w max.

 

[jonescg]

I used a friend's 45 W temp controlled soldering station with a nice clean tip. Oh man, it was a dream to use!

Why do my tips oxidise so easily? I guess they are allowed to get really hot between jobs, so it just burns them up?

 

[amberwolf]

Probably. Turn the temp way down or turn them off when not in use for more than a minute or two; they'll last a lot longer.

It's one reason those "turbo" irons are popular. Some sit running at only a little heat, barely enough to melt solder applied to them, then pressing the turbo button pretty much instantly heats it and your parts to temperature for soldering, for anything normal-sized.

However, I often have left my velleman sitting for hours as I work on something, trying to get my hands and eyes to work well enough at the same time to line up parts and wires and whatnot to get ready to solder togehter. Not uncommon that I have to scrape the tip around int he steel wool repeatedly to get the tip clean enough to retin and solder the joint once I get the parts ready. :lol:

 

[TylerDurden]

I have both the Velleman station and a Weller Therma-boost; the boost gets the most action.

 

[bigmoose]

Why do my tips oxidise so easily? I guess they are allowed to get really hot between jobs, so it just burns them up?

Agree with Amber. The non temperature controlled irons get too hot with no thermal load on them. If you can turn it down or park it with a big blob of solder on it.

 

[liveforphysics]

Get a booster iron. I have 2 top of the line metcal stations that just collect dust if I'm doing anything bigger than SMT parts.

15w/150w is my favorite, but the 20w/120w irons are much easier to find. (and cost about $9)

The tips last forever because when it's sitting it's only a 15w iron.

At the HK factory, they have some massive irons, maybe 200w, and huge spools of thick solder that they use when soldering cell tabs.

The game with cell tab soldering (not really a recommended practice at all) is getting the whole procedure done before the cell has taken enough heat to fail the thermal adhesive seal where the tab exits the pouch. Heatsinking that area with a wet sponge helps.

 

[jonescg]

The game with cell tab soldering (not really a recommended practice at all) is getting the whole procedure done before the cell has taken enough heat to fail the thermal adhesive seal where the tab exits the pouch. Heatsinking that area with a wet sponge helps.

Way ahead of you there

 

[Arlo1]

The game with cell tab soldering (not really a recommended practice at all) is getting the whole procedure done before the cell has taken enough heat to fail the thermal adhesive seal where the tab exits the pouch. Heatsinking that area with a wet sponge helps.

Way ahead of you there

Or you can use the thermal compound to keep the heat from spreading. http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=43948