1 Aug
2015
1 Aug
'15
5:28 p.m.
On 08/01/2015 03:24 PM, Robert Jarratt wrote:
PS A related question. I struggled somewhat with the
Weller Magnastat
No. 8 tip, when trying to solder leads to the ground plane, I could
not get the solder to stay molten very long. I was using lead-free
solder, its melting point is much lower than the temperature which a
No. 8 tip reaches. The iron is 50W. Clearly the ground plane was
taking heat away, but is it a problem with the tip not being hot
enough, the iron not powerful enough, or perhaps some operator error?
I keep my "had it almost as long as my teeth" Weller D550 200/260 watt
gun for the tough jobs requiring a lot of heat in a small
space--soldering to big ground planes, sheet meta, or, as in this
morning, soldering some AWG 12 wire to lugs on a switch. It's fast and
clean and doesn't overheat the workpiece--you can be surprisingly nimble
with one, as compared to, say, an American Beauty 300W iron.
I never use RoHS solder--it simply doesn't wet or flow like 67/37 Sn/Pb
solder. The exception is SMT where components are mounted using solder
paste (powered solder+flux). If I could find some of the leaded stuff,
I'd probably use it.
--Chuck