Solder "sponges"

Brass wool works pretty well. Altenatively a normal cellulose sponge and a razor knife.

cheers

Phil Hobbs

DigiKey?

They're cellulose sponge. I've not seen those sold for home use in a long time. A bit of wet denim works just as well, if not better.

NT

I just get ordinary sponges from the grocery store, they work fine as long as you keep them wet. Othwerwise, you can order specifically designed ones from Digi-Key, Mouser, etc. under the Weller brand. Not worth an order just for that, but you can add it on to another order.

Jon

Some Options if you get satisfaction from an expanding sponge....

Cheers

On a sunny day (Fri, 6 Mar 2015 16:47:04 -0800 (PST)) it happened Phil Hobbs wrote in :

Best is simply collect some solder and rub the point against it. my tips now last years.

On a sunny day (Fri, 06 Mar 2015 22:37:26 -0600) it happened Jon Elson wrote in :

Never use sponges and never use WET ones. That corrodes the tips at the part that is not coated. It is a dirty trick recommended by solder tip sellers. Rub your tip against some solder (clump) to clean it! Do not follow the wet sponge apes.

I typically use my pant leg (DRY denim). But, SWMBO "caught me" in the act: "So *that's* where those marks come from!"

The iron in question is easily 35 years old and the sponge long ago "burned up" and discarded (sponges always seem to fall out of their little "holders" so I don't usually mess with them).

After 30 years I've jsut swapped to the brass "sponges" from the wet sponge. Much much better, cleans better, no cooling of the tip. It looks like the brass "sponge" will last practically for ever, if not it only cost me a couple of dollars via ebay.

Me too. Brass doesn't thermally shock the tip. The iron cladding lasts much longer.

--
Boris

Not nearly as easy with lead free and a nearly 50 degree hotter tip temp.

The best system is metcal. It heats up within 5 to 7 seconds and you turn it off after each use. You tips will last for years, literally.

The turning it on and leaving it on part is what degrades the tip, not the actual use. The other degradation method IS the actual brass wool or wet sponge or other wiping device.

One should wipe the tip, very lightly, right after power on, and temp control is established, right before are making the solder joint. Make the joint, and turn off the iron as you replace the wand in its cradle. No need to wipe after the joint creation, and the next wipe would be after the next re-energization, and prep for the next solder joint.

No time is lost, and you save not only the tip, but the watts that were pushing it.

The cooler tip temp for most of the day is what saves it.

Leaving one on all day, wiped or not, degrades the tinning as well as the plating it attaches (wets) so well to.

It is not the thermal shock, it is hot oxidizing metal. 700 plus degrees in the air. Where do you think dross comes from?

It is the leaving it on all day that degrades it.

It matters not the cleaning method. I see folks leaving theirs on all day replacing tips every couple months. I see folks who turn their iron off between sessions and their tips last years.

The time waiting for the tip to come up is trivial.

Buy a Metcal iron and you even get to cut that to mere seconds. New tips come with new heaters and new sense transducers, so temp management stays tighter too.

I've been using wet sponges for 50+ years. I use plated tips form Weller, almost exclusively. I've gone through several generations of soldering irons, from the ceramic heater ones to Weller 1302B and now the WMP iron. Eventually, after several YEARS, the plating gets worn through and you have to replace the tip.

I do notice the lead-free solders seem to eat the tips more than tin-lead.

Jon

On a sunny day (Sat, 07 Mar 2015 12:21:50 -0600) it happened Jon Elson wrote in :

1, 2, and 4 from the top are Weller magnestat 370 C types IIRC, used with the wet sponge method. 3 and 5 from the top are from my Voltcraft, and actually used more, cleaned by rubbing against a blob of collected 60/40 [1] solder. I learned that from somebody in production at Tek, who had a large solder ball.

I use a Voltcraft LS50:

3 adjustable temperature presets, 320 C with 60/40 [1] is what I use to make prototypes on veroboard. 'test gut' is an understament, I cannot think of any improvement. I bended the spring in the stand a bit to make it easier to work with. The Weller was falling apart anyways, its mechanical switch caused constant interference when measuring small signals, its mechanical construction sucked, its cable was falling apart, the 'connector' for the iron was just a couple of banana type busses, crap.

I used wellers for ?? 30 years at least too, but would not want to use that old model anymore if I got payed to use it.

I only use 60/40 [1] as I design and build for space and aliens only.

[1] it contains (shhh) L*e*A*d and is extremely dangerous and can kill you if it drops on your head or something.

+1

Don't use that commie stuff. Manufacturing does but if they give me a sample, the first thing I do is add lead to the joints I'm working on. ;-)

My iron(s) drop the temperature in seconds and turn off in minutes. It only takes a second for them to come up to temperature from "standby".

I like the new Wellers much better than Metcals. I gave the Metcals away, to another group. ;-)

Yeah, I wish I could go back to all tin/lead! OH, how I wish!

I still do research instruments with tin/lead, but at the production motion control stuff has to be lead-free. I've pretty much gotten up to speed with the stuff at last, but it was a long battle!

Jon

I have always used the freebie compressed sponges from Hilco and other chemical reps. The hold up well, are thicker than the originals, which are horrible in this respect, and you just cut them to size. I actually cut them a bit over sized and let them expand and mushroom in the tray.