Soldering Survey

Hi there. We’re Solder Otter, a team of recent engineering graduates from the University of Waterloo in Canada that is redesigning the soldering iron so soldering electronics can be safer and simpler.

You may have seen the survey we posted back in 2013 when we first started working on Solder Otter. Since then, we’ve built prototypes, won pitch competitions, and learned so much about makers and soldering. We’ve received a lot of positive feedback, so we’re pushing forward with the project beyond graduation.

We have another survey. It’s similar to our last survey, but this one is designed to help us refine our prototype into the best soldering iron for you. We’re reaching out to makers and hobbyists across several forums because we want to learn about your soldering experiences, preferences, and needs. We're also considering designing with children in mind, so if you have any input in that regard, we'd love to hear that too.

If you can spare 10 minutes to fill out our survey (link below), we would really appreciate your input. Thank you! If you have any questions or comments feel free to reply to this post or send us an email at info@solderotter.com.

Link to survey: Maker Soldering Survey5

Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to complete our survey and provided us with your input. We are now closing the survey. Please do feel free to continue to comment. We'll be sure to stay engaged! Or you can email us directly at info@solderotter.com. Thank you!

I didn't like the "This is a required question" message that I got when I didn't want to answer a question.

If a questionnaire is voluntary, why should we be forced to answer every question?

I agree. I had to give an answer that was not what I wanted.

Weedpharma

Also, what's with the obsession with frustration?

Anyway, what I want in my iron is temperature control, durability of the heating element, good quality tips and a very soft heat resistant cable. That's it.
Bonus is if the tips are compatible with another good quality brand.

weedpharma:
I agree. I had to give an answer that was not what I wanted.

I suspect many, like myself, just backed out of it at that point.

Russell.

I was very tempted!

Weedpharma

I got to the stage where I was just ticking the first box that I came to, just so that I could get to the end.

We're Solder Otter, a team of recent engineering graduates from the University of Waterloo in Canada that is redesigning the soldering iron so soldering electronics can be safer and simpler.

I think the problem is that these people are not trained to design surveys and they think that that it is easy.

Designing a survey that gets an accurate result requires skill and a bit of knowledge.

We're sorry that our survey wasn't designed quite right for some of you. We designed the survey to focus on needs and frustrations and we realized many of these might not affect someone who is experienced with soldering. Based on our preliminary conversations with many experienced users, we found that their frustrations tend to be centered on processes or materials, such as frustrations with lead-free solder. At this point we're focusing on redesigning the soldering iron itself. Unfortunately, by the time we realized how many people this was impacting, it was too late to revise the survey without impacting our results. We do appreciate the feedback though and we'll keep it in mind as we design surveys in the future. Thank you!

I would advise that in future you ask the Psychology department to help you formulate your questionnaire, they study that sort of thing.

EDIT
Thanks weedpharma for the correction indicated below

Or even the Psychology Deptment.

Weedpharma

Usually it's the hand that wields the iron that is the problem.

I would have blamed auto text!

Weedpharma

Safer? What's so unsafe about soldering? Try driving.

JoeN:
Safer? What's so unsafe about soldering? Try driving.

I've only burned myself slightly with a soldering iron. Minor, temporary "tatoos". But I'll bet there are people on this board with more permanent scars.

weedpharma:
I would have blamed auto text!

Weedpharma

Yes but I am dyslexic so I blame that. :slight_smile:

JoeN:
Safer? What's so unsafe about soldering?

You have to remember which end of the iron is hot and not put it in your mouth.