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From: EEVblog
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  • @EEVblog Hey Dave, is cleaning the flux off with the anti-static brush for making it look neat or will the flux splashes eventually oxidize or otherwise corrode the copper or solder?

  • probably the best video on the web about soldering! :D

  • Hi Dave, I have trouble removing solder from older joints, the solder sucker doesnt seem to work very well and the solder wick doesnt seem to take away the solder. Do you have any tips to help desoldering plugs?

  • @chromatic1976 You probably need to add some flux, but old joints can be stubborn, try adding a bit more solder to the joint and then wick it away, see how you go. 

  • @radioguyuk thanks for your time, i will try that, i think i need more experience also, thanks again

  • How to make a perfectly good joint :)

  • 7:53 I would guess a cotton stick with some Coke Light would clean this as well. That and another cotton stick with some water/spirit aftwerwards.

  • Great tutorial, thanks!

  • I didn't think I'd learn anything new in this video, but now I realize I've been applying too much solder to my joints. :P

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  • I personally use a 1.8mm conical tip for 95% of my work, I have a 2mm chisel that came with my iron, but I hate working with it. As I rarely move my board around and often rotate my wrist and, by extension, iron around to get where I need to be and find it more difficult and time consuming to always orient the chisel point flat to the pads.

    I disagree that a chisel point is universally required for quality joints and would tell everyone to try both and decide which is best for them.

  • @Danvanm I have bought a chisel tip and has never gone back . FTW .

  • Speaking of somebody who has never heard or used hoof or chisel tips , i have successfully done beautiful joints ... with lots of practice ... it is indeed easier to use a chisel tip .

  • Nice work David.... Really helpful... Thanks for your efforts....

  • The second example was very helpful. In my theater class we were learning how to solder XLR cables and my teacher was not very clear on the instructions.

  • Dave, what size annular rings are on that PCB? They seem larger than what I use on my boards (10 mil). Is that board is for a kit, in which the larger pads are more helpful, or do you prefer larger pads?

  • @hotmessization Larger pads are useful unless you are limited for space.

  • The narration of these videos has just too much repetition..

  • Very helpful, Thanks!

  • best tutorial ever! Thank you for the EEV blog !

  • do a tutorial on pcb design with software including placement and routing

  • dont use those expensive flush cutters. just use nail clippers.

  • Blinking is overrated. But entirely helpful tutorial. Big thanks.

  • Dear dave ....good video...i could fid the video where you talk about surface mount soldering..

  • How do I know what tips will work on my iron? Are they universal or do certain kinds of tips go into certain irons?

  • Dave - Have you ever worked using a solder pot for small runs of through hole boards. If yes, would you consider creating a video showing how to do this?

    BTW - Thank you for your excellent EEVBlog.

  • @gblive12345 No, never used a solder pot personally.

  • Excellent tutorial, very clear

  • Stranded wire scraps can be used effectively for "solder wick", and much cheaper (nothing). :)

    I was taught proper soldering (after 17 years experience) by an instructor who worked for NASA, he drilled into us to use as little solder as possible for weight and corona effect. It's not too difficult when you're working with the same materials in a manufacturing process - you "learn" the higher temps and faster sweeping needed for soldering components on to materials that act as a heat sink.

  • Excellent tutorial Dave! This plus Part 1 is exactly what I needed to help me. Thanks!

  • Great vid Dave! Can you show us the proper technique for doing wires onto solder tags (e.g. switches) please? In particular I want to know the correct way to wrap the wire onto the tag. Cheers!

  • Great! Thanks!

  • As to applying solder to the tip before putting it on a joint you need to apply flux to the joint (liquid or paste) otherwise the solder will not bond properly in the already covered areas when you apply more solder because the flux in the core can't reach covered areas. If you're reheating a joint it's also standard practice to flux it.

  • Hello Dave, I just bouhgt all the things you said =), but the HAKKO-888 I got was an 110v model, I'd notice you did some "transformer wiring hack"? Could you explain it?

    Thanks for all and please keep posting vids, I will keep buying =D

  • Alvays when im soldering something usualy IC or transistors/sensors i fear about overheating them. Never know when critical point is. Dos enyone have a tip how to deal with that?

  • @kildas Experience helps a lot (so if you can, get some extra components of same type to practice on), but if you don't have any, try reading the datasheet. Many datasheets have soldering instructions for hand and wave soldering. Read what it says and stick to it. They'll usually recommend the temperature of the iron and the amount of time in which the joint needs to be made.

  • Hakko FTW.

  • Good video.

    One more thing that I find very helpful in soldering is fine grit (like 600 or 1000 or so) sandpaper to clean oxidized (or greasy) wires and component surfaces. That age-old resistor or the LM317, for example, would have benefitted a lot from a quick little brush-up.

    Sometimes I also use the harder (usually blue) side of an eraser/rubber to polish the pads on a homemade untinned PCB.

  • CHEERS MAN!

  • Dave, I don't think you've cleaned the flux thoroughly. Spraying the board with IPA (isopropyl alcohol) and brushing only spreads the flux around. This can be seen at 12:57. What you need to do is wipe the dissolved flux off.

    Afterwards you can just touch the board to check if it's clean. If it feels a bit sticky, it's not clean at all.

    Cheers!

  • Oh and btw I'm definitely not a pro, I'm totally a beginner, but I'd humbly say there's too little solder on your joint. If I put that little solder on a joint, I'm usually afraid it would break easily later, or the solder might not even have wetted enough the pad/component leg. I like to use more solder, but obviously not enough to make it a huge blob or short out terminals. Could you please point out the technical problems associated with too much solder?

  • @umloginqualquer

    It seems to me that in (most of) the joints we see here the solder fully covers both the component legs and the pads on both sides of the PCB. Solder an IC with the amount of solder that Dave's using in the video and try to rip it off the PCB. My guess would be that the 35µm copper peels off of the PCB before the solder joints break. I'd expect no problems from a moderate solder overdose, though, so I'd say knock yourself out. :)

  • @criscros7 That's what I thought. Thanks for your answer. :) Even though there might be no problem with the amount of solder shown by Dave, I'd rather be on the safe side and put a bit more. AFAIK, it might only be a bit harder to unsolder the component later. The amount of solder I like to use is close to what they show in /watch?v=I_NU2ruzyc4

  • I wonder why the hell every single soldering iron is sold with the conical tip ...

  • @jpelczar Probably so that you have to buy one more tip :-)

  • Dave, another good tip you've forgotten to mention: solder tip in -> solder in -> solder out -> solder tip out. The soldering iron should always be the first thing to touch the joint, and the last thing to leave the joint. I realize you've done it all the time during your video, but the beginners could certainly not notice this detail unless we bring their attention to it.

    (I'd also like you viewers to upvote my comment, so more people could pay attention to this detail.)

  • I guess you have a pretty dirty camera lens there, Dave (:

  • Youre my hero.

  • I like the funny reference at about 7:10-7:15 in the video lol

  • When I solder a TO-220 tab to copper, I create a small loop out of 0.5mm solder with a circumference slightly bigger than the tab hole. I sandwich the solder loop between the copper and the tap and heat it whole thing with iron until the solder melts underneath.

  • I use fingernail clippers to cut the wires from joints.

  • I wish I would of seen this video when I first started, I saw a bunch and all were confusing and boring. Yours are very explained and very dead on accurate. I have a soldapull pump and use that instead of wick, but which one would you recommend? I sometimes have a hard time sucking up all the solder with the pump.

  • METCAL irons are the best. I use an old second hand Metcal and it beats anything else !

  • It can be quite hard for a soldering professional to actually do an example of a bad solder joint.

    Macro video shooting and trying to do an example bad joint is really hard!

  • i use a conical tip and it works just fine. It doesn't come down to a point it has a mostly flat end that is fairly large. I use the side of the tip just next to the end and it works great.

  • Dave do you think it is good practice when soldering IC's to skip a leg in between solder joints so that you don't overheat areas of the IC.

    Ex. Say you're soldering a 555 timer chip, you'd solder pins 1 and 3 first, then move back to 2 and 4. Repeat on other side.

  • @Nadrealis Not really necessary. When you have good iron and solder it takes only second or two to do one pin, so it doesn't heat up much. The board helps to cool it as well as the IC body heat capacity. With modern silicon devices it's generally no problem when you heat them longer.

  • @Nadrealis It may keep the die at a lower temp, but in practice the device can handle either method. If I have multiple chips on a board, I'll often alternate between devices, just to let them cool more, just because I can.

  • @Nadrealis I've always used a socket and soldered that to the board then plugged the IC in. It cost a bit more but I've never had to worry about over heating an IC.

  • @TheGeek001 Good idea. There's no thermal transfer between socket and IC?

  • @Nadrealis Nope cause you don't plug the IC in till after you solder the socket. I usually wait until after the whole board is done or at least the section I need to currently test.

  • @Nadrealis

    Hey. I can give you one more advice: I've been working for a while for a company that made motherboards [nvm the company name ;) ], and we did some repairs on boards.

    When we resoldered multipile leg chips, we just did the soldering trhoug all of them, and if there wer any legs betwin them we just used flux to take them down.

    If you soldier one chip in the right temperature you won't burn it in most cases.

    Propably in next tutorial Dave will give some advice about 168 leg chips ;)

  • @MacKMir That is really cool! Are hand solderers used anymore in the USA? If so, are they IPC trained?? I love talking to people like you because you actually know what's going on!

  • @Nadrealis

    Have no idea how they do it in USA :P but the boss of the company was Korean, and the seccond one was from india, and as far as I know, they did the whole training at the beginning.

    As for your question about reworking I supose YES - hand solderers are used, and they're doing very well - sometimes even better than automated soldering lines.

    After my 4 week soldering training (4 weeks, 8 hour/day only hand soldering) I had an exam of how I solder.

    Hand solderers are awesome tools!

  • Very useful tips (pun not intended). For the shirt, check out eevblog dot com slash merch. Thanks for taking the time to share your knowledge and experience.

  • Great tutorial! I am looking forward to the SMD one.

  • Dave, when i'm soldering TH, i always put my solder tin against my irom while my iron is against the leg, then the solder starts flowing and then i remove my solder tin from my iron, but i still add some.

    I can't explain it really good, it would be better in my mother language (dutch), but ist's a little bit like u do at 8:50 , but then with my tin against my iron.

    Should i put the temp. of my iron higher? It's now t about 450 - 470 degrees C.

  • You're not doeing your best but it's anyaway better than me XD

    When i have to solder something i ask a to friend. (i'm really not a manual guy)

  • Great video. I have one question though, where did you get that t-shirt?

  • Thank you Dave! I learned so much from these tutorials! Now I'm going to practice some soldering! Thank you so much!!!

  • @gabrielfinol practice makes perfect

  • The tutorial, is geared towards professionally (rather than home-made) made boards in the following regards:

    1) In my experience, when using a board that is not pre-tinned, wetting the iron slightly is not optional, but essential if you want to heat up the board in a reasonable amount of time.

    2) Similarly, about the height of the solder joint. For a through-plated hole, that minimum height is fine. For a one-sided board, it needs to be higher.

  • Nothing about tinning the tip? Dave, I'm surprised.

  • Hey, nice tutorial. Around 11.20 on the video when you are talking about the tip life I noticed that there's a narrow trace connected between two thicker ones. Is this somekind of fuse made of PCB trace? Do you have any tips how to calculate one? What other tricks can you do with the PCB traces and tracks, is it possible to make a surge arrester for example or sth like that :). Thanks

  • whats with the color of the video?

    the zooming makes me seasick

  • my friend tried yesterday to solder on a heatsink...

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  • @elomatreb To what, a CPU? lol

  • @superdau: Things like that you can find in Datasheets ;) And resistors and so on are very robust,they easily take 450°C for many seconds

  • How much heat can components take? The way you "bathed" the TO220 component in liquid solder for many seconds, I feared it will be fried for sure. Was this just for camera or can you really cook them like that?

  • @superdau Longer than needed for the camera. But remember, just because the iron is set to 350degC or whatever does not mean that's what the component itself (and the internal die) will be. The device temp will be substantially lower. So yes, the device will survive this easily.

  • that's so funny, when I was a student, I worked for Motorola Semiconductors in Munich and the MC14569BCP was a very common part there. I think I have had many of those under the microscope to check for ESD damage. Oh the memories :-)

    pj

  • You do NOT want top clean the tip before putting it back in the stand, as the solder protects it from oxidising - always clean on the way out, not in.

  • ★★★★★

  • Hi Dave,

    Nice video. My main comment is that you didn't push home the need the CLEAN every thing just prior to soldering. Flux is great but can only go so far. If all the components, pcb, solder, Iron tip etc are oxide free (as far as possible) then the chances of a good joint are far greater than if they are not. Preping the joint is a must especially if the components have been in a draw for a few months (Years?). With experience you can work around this but Newbies should start out right!.

  • You might also want to mention that when you're soldering wires to connectors with solder-cups, you should be very careful to avoid moving the wire while the solder is cooling or you can end up with a very weak and cold-joint.

  • @xjet and not heating the cups/pins too long or the plastic holding them gets melted and you end up with bent or not straight pins

  • If you want to form a true cold joint, you need to heat only the pad. In the worst case, it results in a joint that you can physically remove the component!

  • Dave, once again your instruction is second to none. Great vid.

  • The damp sponge is ok for tip cleaning. But Hakko's cheap brass shaving tip cleaner (599B) is even better.

    You don't have to keep a wet sponge around. Plus there's no thermal shock to your iron by bringing the tip into contact with water. Just stab it in a few times and you're good to go.

    For only 10 bucks it's a winner in my book and makes the old standby the sponge obsolete.

  • I just got my new soldering station!

  • @oshondrom I'm having a good time waiting for mine!

  • i dont really do SMD stuff but i have a DSE temperature controlled iron and 0.8mm solder. i may have to get another iron as the tip on the DSE iron is getting shagged. but yea some good tips in there

  • Hey, nice stuff again Dave. Thanks much!

    The first chip you did gave me a good idea..

    Bend the second pins in on each corner of the chip to hold it down tight

    then solder the 4 outer corner pins. Straighten the bent pins and solder the rest.

    This might be useful if you need to solder a chip after already having higher components on the board.

    Also thinking I need to get a good station. I still have the same mains (albiet with temp adjust) soldering iron that I bought in the early 80's.

  • @philbx1 Yes, it's common to bend IC legs to hold them in place, just like other components. When doing boards like this I like to solder all the IC's before any higher components, so there is no need to bend the legs.

  • I like the 317T's theyre great. I usually mount them with the machined heatsinks and hardware. Oh yeah.. anyone like the Metcal MX-50xx irons? I have a Hakko 936 that I love.

  • I didn't think you would keep me watching for the whole 34 minutes, but the time went by really fast. When you get a chance can you show how to use liquid flux?

  • That 1489 its a RS232 interface chip. "Quad Line Receiver". I learned soldering by desoldering and resoldering old scrap junk boards from various electronics. The more you do it the better you will get.

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  • Guys, dont be tricked into buying desolder wick w/o flux embedded into it. It needs flux to work. I bought a handful of desolder wicks w/o flux and had to throw them in the trash

  • @bcsupport Yes, without flux they are useless!

  • @EEVblog As solder wick yes, but don't throw them away if you accidentally buy that stuff. You may use them as pretty flexible grounding straps in various projects. ;)

  • @bcsupport You could use it to replace the brush connections on scale electric cars.... That's the only use I could think for them XD

  • @bcsupport

    couldn't you just dip them in flux?

  • @bcsupport Don't throw them out next time. Just dip the end in some flux (I use the plumber stuff in a can). it works great.

  • Comment removed

  • @t3h1337h4xx0rz

    Plumber's flux conducts electricity, you'll short out your board that way, make sure to use electrician's flux, not pipe-fitter's flux.

  • @kiyotewolf Don't worry, it says non-conductive and non-corrosive right on the front ;)

  • Great videos and good tips. Probably most people will get to all the conclusion in this video by exercising.

    When I solder dip components I solder first the opposite pins on diagonal so that it better stay in place.

    On connectors like the DB9 in your video I tin only the wire and the get that inside the cup and finalise the soldering by adding some solder. 

  • 2:25AM Eastern Time! I'll go to bed at 3AM, no big deal.

  • @LauxHawk lol

  • Your making me stay up late to watch this!

  • first!

    

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