Soldapullt original vs III

[drlegendre .]

I've used Hakko vacuum de-soldering stations, and will agree that - at
least for production work - they are superior. But most of my handwork and
re-work has been with spring-loaded solder suckers, and here's what I've
found.

The full-size 'Soldapult' devices are probably the best of the bunch, in
terms of both vacuum power and displacement. They're also easier than some
to clear out. Now having said this, I will NEVER again buy a genuine Edsyn
Soldapult tool, after my experience with that company.  It went like this:

Bought a brand-new full-size Soldapult at +retail+ from an auth'd
distributor. It worked for exactly around 20 minutes until it broke,
totally. Said distributor +refused+ to take it back, told me to contact the
manufacturer (and you'll see why, next). Contacted Edsyn and they simply
refused to warranty it - period - no matter what.. I even told them exactly
what went wrong and asked for the (simple) parts I'd need to repair it.

Nope! Sorry! Nada.

Then I got on the eBay and bought 2X of the China knock-offs plus 4X spare
tips, which have been working fine now for 7-8 yrs. I put my faith in Edsyn
and they just gave me the fat finger. Heck with that outfit.

On Mon, Jan 16, 2017 at 9:00 PM, Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Mon, Jan 16, 2017 at 7:33 PM, dwight <dkelvey at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > It is interesting, I do take longer with the hand tools but I've never
> > seen as much damage as with a desoldering type iron.
> > The tips are too small to hold a good tin and the suction cools the
> > joint too fast.
> >
> > Doing it with regular irom and a pullit does take skill. One has to know
> > how to work the pin and the iron. One has to know when a pin is
> > desoldered by feel.
> >
>
> I've always had mediocre results at best when using a separate sucker, and
> good results with a vacuum desoldering station. I use a Hakko 472D-01, and
> it works beautifully. I've desoldered thousands of connections with it, and
> have never had any damage to PCBs or components.  I have two different size
> tips for it, and haven't had any issue with the tip tinning. Once the
> solder melts and you hit the button, it extracts the solder far faster than
> it can cool, so I've never had any problem with cooling the joint to
> quickly.
>
> Patience is also required.
> >
>
> Patience is almost always a good idea, but it's not required with a good
> vacuum desoldering station. Last fall I installed a DIN 41612 connector on
> the wrong side of a board, and only discovered that after soldering more
> than half of the 96 pins. I thought it was going to be a nightmare removing
> it, but the Hakko made short work of it (less than 5 minutes), and it came
> out very cleanly.
>
> Hakko says that the replacement for the discontinued 472D-01 (110W) is the
> FR410-03 (140W), and it looks like a nice unit, but it is much more
> expensive. The FM-204 (70W) would be easier on the budget, but I haven't
> tried it, so I have no idea whether the reduced wattage would be an issue.
>
> Some people may be unaware that with temperature-controlled soldering
> equipment, more wattage is almost always better.  That is NOT true for
> uncontrolled (or poorly controlled) soldering equipment, such as cheap
> soldering pencils; with those it's quite possible and easy to damage
> boards, as a consequence of either too little or too much wattage.
>
> Eric
>