Soldering iron

I'd spend a little bit more and go for an Ersa soldering station. The tips of Ersa are very good.

--
Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply
indicates you are not using the right tools...
nico@nctdevpuntnl (punt=.)
--------------------------------------------------------------

...or a Hakko:

nb

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I've used a Hakko model 926 for nearly 20 years now. A newer Hakko FP-

101 has been serving me for almost 10 years. I continue to be extremely happy with both units and should a day come when one of them konks out and dies it will be another Hakko that replaces it.

--

Michael Karas
Carousel Design Solutions
http://www.carousel-design.com

Hakko is good. Have their portable solder sucker (808) and it's pretty bullet proof. Except that the little plastic button that covers the cal pot keeps getting lost; vinyl tape works as a stand-in...

With that in mind, if the OP is getting a new iron then this may be the time to get a combination unit. A vacuum-pump sucker is SO much easier than wick or the spring-loaded suckers.

--
Rich Webb     Norfolk, VA

I'd spend a lot more and get a Metcal.

--

John Larkin, President
Highland Technology, Inc

jlarkin at highlandtechnology dot com
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

Precision electronic instrumentation
Picosecond-resolution Digital Delay and Pulse generators
Custom laser controllers
Photonics and fiberoptic TTL data links
VME thermocouple, LVDT, synchro   acquisition and simulation

I second that. Best soldering iron I ever owned.

Also, consider the DS1 desoldering gun.

You ain't kidding when you say "a lot more". From the prices I've seen, 2X-4X more! For those prices, do they come with a sexy babe to hold the iron? ;)

nb

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Ditto on Hakko.

Metcal has their fanatics.

From the Metcal owners I know, they work well but need repair often.

I don't know what these irons are without looking up. I do know a pencil thin iron is the way to go. After using a pencil thin iron, those big things are a joke. That weller was also very high in watts.

Greg

Metcals are nice but there is one flaw that you have to watch out for, or at least be aware of, that can happen.

Since they operate by using RF, if the coax connection goes bad, the iron can break ICs. We had a Metcal a few years ago that was being used for PCB mods and almost every 74HC14 added to those boards died, but not necessarily right away. It was like a nightmare until we figured it out. We don't use them anymore because of that.

boB

Still using the Ungar, do they still exist? pencil, but not so thin, iron purchased circa 1959, WITH the original gold plated tip. And we're talking pretty constant use, too.

After some difficulty soldering components, learned to use larger iron than thought necessary. Went to one of those tiny, tiny thin pencil types once and discovered the thermal mass was a bit too low for discrete components. When the thermal mass is too low, it takes longer to get the solder to melt, thus the thermal shock to the part is worse, gets noticeably hotter when finished. So, went back to a big iron that soldered so fast that the part could be held in your fingers. ...less heat to transfer back up into an IC.

Many people choose a tip which is too small. When soldering doesn't work they crank up the temperature which ruins the tip. If the tip is big and the temperature right (so the flux doesn't burn) the surface tension will do the job for you.

--
Failure does not prove something is impossible, failure simply
indicates you are not using the right tools...
nico@nctdevpuntnl (punt=.)
--------------------------------------------------------------

Mine is about 6 years old, no problems so far. I like the fast warmup, huge available heating power, and the ability to change tips and be soldering again in 15 seconds or so.

--

John Larkin, President
Highland Technology, Inc

jlarkin at highlandtechnology dot com
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

Precision electronic instrumentation
Picosecond-resolution Digital Delay and Pulse generators
Custom laser controllers
Photonics and fiberoptic TTL data links
VME thermocouple, LVDT, synchro   acquisition and simulation

Don't forget the Space Odyssey monolith chic. ;)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics

160 North State Road #203
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510
845-480-2058

hobbs at electrooptical dot net
http://electrooptical.net

daah-daaaaah-Ta-DAAAAH!

What's weird is that it has a huge rocker-type power switch on the front, but it runs warm, vampire power, even when it's switched off. Oh well, it's usually chilly in my office anyhow.

--

John Larkin, President
Highland Technology, Inc

jlarkin at highlandtechnology dot com
http://www.highlandtechnology.com

Precision electronic instrumentation
Picosecond-resolution Digital Delay and Pulse generators
Custom laser controllers
Photonics and fiberoptic TTL data links
VME thermocouple, LVDT, synchro   acquisition and simulation

We use the cheap Metcals. In the 4 years we've been using them, no problems yet. Wonderful irons.

Everything in my lab runs off two big Isobars--I just flip them off when I leave the lab. At some point I need to install a 12-way splitter and distribution amp on my Rb frequency standard so I don't have to wait for all the 10811As in my HP boat anchors to warm up.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics

160 North State Road #203
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510
845-480-2058

hobbs at electrooptical dot net
http://electrooptical.net

The (older) ones I have switch the secondary so you are just seeing transformer losses. I don't know any reason why the primary could not be switched. Also, I find the report of bad cable killing solid state devices pretty remote. Even a lose connector will cause the unit to shut down and require reseting the power to get it back on again. They monitor the vswr for faults.

Why not slave everything to one of the boat anchors. Don't they keep power supplied to the OCXO when off? At least the 856x does. They all have an in and an out for their clocks as far as I remember. Then you just need to keep power supplied to that device.

The Rb should always be powered as it takes a long time to fully reach a stable equilibrium. But maybe your requirements are not that demanding.

Next you should get one of the Trimbel Thunderbolts for < $200 and have a GPS traceable reference.

tm