DIY SMD Reflow Oven in Elektor January 2006

thanks for the pointer Robert, I was not aware of this publication. I noticed from the CC article that infrared heaters are preferred, I can see why. Circuit Cellar, wasn't that just Steve Garcia many moons ago?

Rick

The wok approach is required for mil-spec compliance.

:-)

May be a brilliant idea, but published some months ago in Circuit Cellar :

Friendly, Robert

"RickB" a écrit dans le message de news: snipped-for-privacy@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...

Maybe not for the faint of heart... I reflow in a wok on a gas range. Medium flame is about right on profile judging from visual cues only: flux activation in about a minute, and reflow starts about 2 minutes later. ISO certification is unlikely, but not a concern here.

Ciarcia, IIRC.

Cheers! Rich

And, of course, don't neglect that famous Chinese cookbook, "How to wok your dog"...

Cheers! Rich

And I just thought you ran a blowtorch up and down the board untill stuff starts to drip...

--
Dirk

The Consensus:-
The political party for the new millenium
http://www.theconsensus.org

I guess it can be truly said, you wok like a man. :-)

Ed

I don't think that's necessarily true. My observations have been:

1) For basic electronics, people seem to want to find resources on-line these day, and there are some very good web sites out there. This eliminates some of the demand for printed articles that are mostly of a tutorial nature. Likewise, for people looking for projects to put together, there's thousands of them instantly available on the 'net. 2) Many people who historically would have designed some circuit with a 555, discrete transistors, etc. can now just "use a PIC" or similar microcontroller to solve a much broader range of problems, and for a price that's still quite inexpensive. In other words, a lot of people out there who might historically have been hobbyist circuit designers are now closer to hobbyist systems integrators. (To a large extent, this is out of necessity -- no single person is going to sit around and design their own WiFi adapter at the transistor level...!)

If anything, I'd say there are MORE electronic hobbyists out there now than ever before; countries that have recently become more technologically focused such as China and India are significantly contributing to this. It's just that the type of information these people want is often not necessarily in like with, e.g., Elektor...

I don't think publications like Circuit Cellar Ink, Nuts & Volts, or Make Magazine (just celebrating its one year annivesary!) are going away any time soon. Personally I'm surprised that QEX is still around, advertising a circulation of 8,000 copies per month -- I hope it doesn't go away anytime soon either.

---Joel

"RickB" schreef in bericht news: snipped-for-privacy@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...

FAIK he still is. You may remember him from the days of Byte. Never knew what happened but one day Circuit Cellar disappeared from Byte and came out on its own. (I missed some issues at the time so it might have been announced.) Byte went down, once tried to rise again but did not make it. Apparently Circuit Cellar is still alive and kicking. Guess Elektor wants (or needs) to follow the CC formula if it wants to survive. The popularity of hobby electronics seems to be decreasing to say the least.

petrus bitbyter

I've now had a chance to compare both designs and if we are beleive the time/temperature graphs the Elektor project seems to have the better temperature control.

Rick

Strange you should say that. Elektor being alive and kicking too (cf EPE and EW) witness their recent free offerings with the mag (DVD in November 05, VB booklet in January 06) and I can't see why they should 'follow the CC formula' . The Americans may not like to hear it, but the European electronics DIY and small-lab scere dwarfs anything still going on in the US. The total print run of the international editions of Elektor is >100k, their strength is in languages (the spoken ones, I mean).

Rick

RickB wrote [without context]:

Context on Google Groups--the easy way:

't-click-the-reply-link-that-is-in-plain-sight+To-get-context-the-easy-way+on-Google+zzz+show-options*-*-*-snip-*-*-*-*-the-automated-blockquote-*-*-*+click-THAT-Reply-link

It looks interesting... I'm going to give it a try.

Argos sell a Hinari toaster oven for 19.95 ukp. It has a 6.5 ltr capacity

- about a 3rd of the size (and cost) of the oven used in the article.