1 Aug
2015
1 Aug
'15
5:12 p.m.
On Aug 1, 2015, at 6:36 PM, TeoZ <teoz at
neo.rr.com> wrote:
I still use a bunch of lead solder I purchased to fix the RAM on a C64 back in the late
1980's plus you can still get it from China on ebay super cheap.
Fortunately, real solder is still readily available; my current tools catalog (from
Stanley Tools, I think) has a whole section for solder and soldering equipment, and while
more than half of the solder listing is various flavors of lead-free, the real stuff is
still there, too. That includes the good stuff: 63-37 eutectic, which is the kind to go
for if you can.
Just this week I fixed an Apple Ibook G3-500 that had the connector for the
trackpad/mouse come off the board from bad lead free soldering at the factory (what a pain
stripping the whole unit to get the motherboard out). You can get all kinds of fixable and
useful equipment cheap because of bad solder joints these days if you like to fix things.
The Chinese knock-off soldering equipment isn't too bad for the hobbyist. I just
snagged a desolding gun with vacuum pump for $100ish a few months back and it works very
well.
I still have the Weller temperature-controlled (Curie effect) unit I bought 40 years ago.
That too is still available (WTCPT), and still excellent. It is fairly high power, so you
get the safety of an effective temperature control with the flexibility of a higher power
iron.
paul