Desoldering: Was (Re: Advice on Lisa 2 restoration)

Perhaps I am just weird, but I rarely damage circuit boards or components when de-soldering. I have a Hakko 808 de-soldering gun. The biggest things I have learned from de-soldering are: Add fresh solder where you are able to, I have notices as solder ages and oxidizes it gets to be a nightmare to melt. Also fresh Flux can help some times. Keep your de-soldering nozzle cleaned, I use the sponge on my Hakko 936 ESD safe temp controlled solder station. Once you hear the de-soldering gun start to labor, you need to check for obstructions, and make sure your receptacle is NOT full of solder and the flux filter is not plugged up. I am at the point on it where 95% of the time I can get IC sockets out of pc boards without damaging them. And have yet to *knock on wood* lift a trace on a board I was repairing, including the ATARI XF551 single sided boards where the traces are held on with good wishes. That isn't to say I haven't pulled components from boards and then been amazed at the crap that some manufacturers put into their products. I'd rather pay 5-10$ more and have a manufacturer use quality components :( I wish my AOIUE hot air rework station also had a good de-solder gun on it, that way I wouldn't need 3 or 4 things to do the builds and repairs on equipment.