Jenine Bressner's Soldering Tutorial

One of our assignments in the Fab Academy (at AS220) was to write tutorials to share what we were learning. I demonstrated soldering components onto a step response circuit board that was milled on a Modela CNC router. My technique was informed by my soldering experience in silversmithing. This was recorded in the Fab Lab at AS220 in Providence, Rhode Island.
http://JenineBressner.blogspot.com
http://as220.org/labs/fabacademy/

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• Jenine Bressner
• AS220
• fab lab
• fablab
• tutorial
• soldering
• solder
• modela
• cnc
• circuit board
• circuitboard
• technique

[JenineProvidence]

I look off to the side sometimes because this video was recorded with two cameras on two laptops. I was checking to make sure that my hands were in the frame onscreen.

[JenineProvidence]

Thanks! My other experience with soldering comes from stained glass.

I've only begun with circuitry in the past few months, and I haven't yet used solder paste. I have so much more to learn and I look forward to doing it!

[JenineProvidence]

@n3rdbear

You can't smell me from there.

[PariahOfTheKOHLM]

Thank you for posting this SO much, Jenine! I never thought to try to cut and squish the solder like you do. This is a fantastic method. You gotta get used to it, but I would imagine this helping on quite a few projects I have coming up. Thanks!

[brenw20]

Unfortunately this technique has its problems, mainly around flux. Flux helps to achieve a clean reliable join by removing oxidation. Borax is usually used as a flux in silver soldering whereas flux is inside rosin cored electrical solder. By heating the solder you are burning off the flux which is the smoke coming off in the video. You either need to add straight flux or heat the part first then apply solder once hot to obtain a clean reliable joint.

[Wop2k]

2 things I do not get:

1) Why didn't you rout the board correctly so the pins wouldn't be reversed wehen using your pin header?

2) Use a SMD pin header if you prefer SMD parts!

[woodshopart]

great idea, thanks Jenine : )

~lox

[kaynapundai]

great idea, thanks for sharing

[jimday666]

cutie, thanks for the tip