Soldering iron 20w vs 30w

[LarryD]

@m147

I'm looking to get an inexpensive iron for starting out and learning

inexpensive != quality

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• Save up and buy a better quality iron.
  Quality is important when buying a soldering iron.
  If you will be doing a lot of future work in electronics, a good iron will be the best investment.

• I have used the FX-888D for many years, does everything I need.

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FYI

Video 0010

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Two Terminal SMD Component Removal When you use a soldering iron to remove a two (2) terminal SMD device, you need to heat/unsolder both terminals at the same time. For example, when you have a 1206 resistor, both ends of the resistor need to be unsoldered simultaneously. You can use two soldering irons to do the above, or you can bridge the SMD with a wide tipped soldering iron. These SMD components are rigid and will not flex, hence a spatula will not fit under the device when just on…

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Circuit Prototyping Construction A new user eventually asks: “Now that I have made my circuit work on a solderless breadboard, how do I make it permanent.” The following images show a technique I use to make a one time, Point-to-Point circuit on a prototyping PCB. This is a valid way of wiring up a project circuit board; when you need to make several such circuits, it might be time to get PCBs made. If others have additional suggestions they can pass on, please do. The first thing we need…

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Heat Insertion of Brass Inserts I use M2, M3 and 2-56 brass inserts in electronic enclosures. 600, M2 brass inserts cost less than $20.00. For years I have used a soldering iron tip to install these Brass Inserts in plastic. 10 months ago, I upgraded to proper Heat Insertion Iron Tips. These tips are easy to install, fit the HAKKO FX888D soldering iron, fit standard 936 soldering irons, easy to use and highly effective. You can buy 3 different styles of these tips sets. These are inexpensive,…

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SMD Component Desoldering Tip Addendum It became obvious the following changes to the DIY SMD de-soldering tip construction method could be easier. Here you can see the 14AWG wire is captured between the M4 screw head and a washer. This method lets you adjust the length of the copper tips. De-soldering temperature is set to 350°C . No Silver Wire Soldering necessary. [AA] [BB] [CC] [SMD De-Soldering]

SMD De-Soldering

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Removing an Arduino 8 Pin Header Further to Post #1280 The images below show a process that effectively removes male header pins from your Arduino PCB. The key to this process is to solder a conductor to the bottom of all the pins. We use this connection, so all the pins are pulled equally. See this PDF for a 1:1" soldering tip pattern. Soldering Tip.pdf (29.5 KB) [A] [B] [C] [D] [E] EDIT [F] [Removing Male Headers]

Removing Male Headers

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SMD De-Soldering with I.C. Glue Removal Tools This technique was briefly mentioned earlier in this thread. It is repeated here to clarify the process. The images below should explain the process. Watch the YouTube Video for a bit more instruction. [A] [B] [C] [D] [F] [G] [H] [I] [J] Edit See the next post for video.

SMD I.C. Removal Using I.C. Glue Removal Tool

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@m147

Also, learn to solder on veroboard and eventually do some simple projects.

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Magnet / Enamel Prototyping Wire Further to Post #1352 and #1353 In some situations, we might want to use Enamel Insulated Wire to make connections on our prototyping PCB. See the images below showing the wiring processes. You can buy this wire from many places on the internet, one store I use is: Suggest you use: for signal connections 0.19mm Solderable Enamel (Insulated) wire (100mA). for bus wire 0.25mm tinned copper (228mA). See the short YouTube video showing the removal of the en…