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Desolder equipment recommendations.


dhe

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SOOOO Many years. Most of my soldering stuff was obtained from Radio Shack in the 70's and 80's.

 

I did, in the late 90's, on Tim Tesch recommendation, order a temperature controlled soldering iron.

 

For desoldering I've depended on a RS Soldering IRON with a bulb and a RS plunger style de solder - and of course braid to clean up through holes.

 

So I've noticed on some more modern you tube channels, people de soldering with a gun type arrangement. Can any one make a recommendation for or against soldering guns and if for, which one they recommend?

 

Thanks,

Dano

 

When I moved to FL the town I'm in had two Radio Shacks, an two electronics parts houses (Skippers and Electronics Plus) and Hank's Electronics Repair. Now, they are all gone... =(

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SOOOO Many years. Most of my soldering stuff was obtained from Radio Shack in the 70's and 80's.
 
I did, in the late 90's, on Tim Tesch recommendation, order a temperature controlled soldering iron.
 
For desoldering I've depended on a RS Soldering IRON with a bulb and a RS plunger style de solder - and of course braid to clean up through holes.
 
So I've noticed on some more modern you tube channels, people de soldering with a gun type arrangement. Can any one make a recommendation for or against soldering guns and if for, which one they recommend?
 
Thanks,
Dano
 
When I moved to FL the town I'm in had two Radio Shacks, an two electronics parts houses (Skippers and Electronics Plus) and Hank's Electronics Repair. Now, they are all gone... =(
I have this. It makes desolder easy.


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8 hours ago, arcadeshopper said:

I have this. It makes desolder easy.

 

 

 

I second arcadeshopper's Hakko.  In the past I have bought a FR-300 for myself and others. The current model is FR-301.

 

You can get a deal here: https://www.tequipment.net/search/?F_Keyword=hakko fr-301

The extra nozzles are nice, but you can get working with the basic kit. You'll need to buy some more consumables though.

 

I got a deal they used to have on an FR-300 desoldering + FX-888 soldering.

There are usually deals for 11% off list price of Hakko stuff. Fry's used to have them on the shelf.

 

There are more sophisticated ones out there, but the Hakko is the most affordable and a breeze to work with. 

Oh yeah, don't bother with the cheap knockoffs. The Hakko will last a long time if you take care to clean it.

 

 

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#1 rule for rework: Desoldering is twice as hard as soldering.

 

The vacuum-powered desolder tools are generally well worth the money if you use them enough (which is what makes their high cost a hard decision to make for a hobbyist).  Like arcadeshopper, I spent the money on a Hakko FR-300 some years ago, and I'm very glad to have it for DIP rework.  But it is a single-task tool, so for me it does not get used much.  I also find that you have to be very careful with it since it gets very hot and can easily dump too much heat into a pad and even damage the PCB substrate.

 

The more professional vacuum stations are the next step up from the hand-held ones.  Going the in the cheaper direction are the manual pumps and the heated gizmos with the air-bulb on them, both of which I have used, and neither of which I would recommend.

 

A good hot-air rework station will go a long way these days.  Also, ChipQuik.

 

The #2 rule of rework: keep everything (tips, surfaces, parts, etc.) clean and use a good no-clean flux!

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 years later...

I had to pull apart the Hakko FR-300 and cleaned it - it wasn't sucking.

 

There is a back piece labeled pre-filter aluminum.

B5016

 

The parts I'm finding are flat:

image.thumb.png.6d82322e49b496b9f0aa1347c81b5334.png

 

Yet the one in my gun has a bowl on top:

image.thumb.png.5f10db34b3175669a47fd6581fcff19f.png

 

Anyone ran in to this?

 

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12 hours ago, dhe said:

Yet the one in my gun has a bowl on top:

image.thumb.png.5f10db34b3175669a47fd6581fcff19f.png

 

Anyone ran in to this?

 

I have the FR-301 and that is the proper part for the 301.  I can’t speak to the FR-300.

 

On 1/13/2020 at 2:40 PM, dhe said:

Ok, I bit the big one and got a FR-300. Now, for you folks with actual experience, what tip do you use on most TI Equipment?

 

I use the stock 1mm tip for all my TI work.  Just this week I desoldered the 9901, 9900, Roms, static ram and vram on two boards and socketed the boards for my diagnostic boards.  It went flawless.  I did think about getting a .6mm tip, but honestly I had no problems at all.  

I also considered the longer tip so you can suck up the solder from the top side of the board if you need to, but I found that reflowing some solder and then desoldering again did the trick nicely. 

 

Tip: make sure you make contact with the pin and it goes super fast and sucks up the solder nicely.  I use the medium heat setting.  It takes less than 2 seconds to melt the solder.  

 

Edited by Cory
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I use the same one that Arcadeshopper uses.  I purchased mine from Amazon, it's about $100 cheaper today though!   I got mine about 6 months ago.

 

American HAKKO FR301-03/P ESD Safe Portable Desoldering Tool with Precise Temperature Control °F /°C: Amazon.com: Tools & Home Improvement

 

Just remember to clean the nozzle before you power it off and it will be ready for next use..

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I received my FR301 this afternoon.  Early impressions are that it is easy to hold, the temperature is constant, and it does a really nice overall job of solder removal.  I estimate that it cut my desoldering time in half because unlike my old Pacenter, the Hakko made for clean removal on the first try.  (I believe that my old station's suction power had diminished over time).

 

The only potential problem (concern) is that the Hakko got clogged four times.  I was de-soldering three sockets that had residual flux and after 8 or 9 pins, I had to use the nozzle tool to unclog the unit.  My Pacenter never had this problem with flux/residue.  I'll try a few Myarc cards once I get the current board off of my bench.  Here is a pic of the board that I desoldered today. 

image.thumb.png.15635c4d9a5917d8601eef9de263e832.png

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10 hours ago, InsaneMultitasker said:

I ordered the FR301 Thursday based in part on above recommendations.   I damaged my Pacenter 20A desoldering iron that I've been using for nearly 25 years while trying to remove the tip. :(  I'm looking forward to trying the FR301 this weekend.

 

I think you’ll really like it! 

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I received my FR301 this afternoon.  Early impressions are that it is easy to hold, the temperature is constant, and it does a really nice overall job of solder removal.  I estimate that it cut my desoldering time in half because unlike my old Pacenter, the Hakko made for clean removal on the first try.  (I believe that my old station's suction power had diminished over time).
 
The only potential problem (concern) is that the Hakko got clogged four times.  I was de-soldering three sockets that had residual flux and after 8 or 9 pins, I had to use the nozzle tool to unclog the unit.  My Pacenter never had this problem with flux/residue.  I'll try a few Myarc cards once I get the current board off of my bench.  Here is a pic of the board that I desoldered today. 
image.thumb.png.15635c4d9a5917d8601eef9de263e832.png
Might run it a little longer to pull the solder through

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I checked my unit today. It is a 301, not a 300.

 

Yea, I think left behind flux tends to stop it up quicker.

 

I lifted a pad yesterday - because as it was getting stopped up, I pushed down to hard. Lesson learned, if it doesn't seem to be doing it's job - stop and clean.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The tip of the desoldering tool gets very hot, so absolute minimum time in contact with any pad is critical.  Technically, you are not supposed to let the tip touch the pad at all, but rather keep the liquid solder between the tip and the pad, while moving the tool in a back-and-forth or circular motion to make sure the pin is free; then activate the vacuum.

 

It takes a lot of practice for sure, and I have had the heat of the desolder tool affect the epoxy of the PCB substrate itself.

 

On older PCBs is does not take much to lift a pad, since the adhesive bonding the copper to the board has aged and on cheap boards it will release.  I usually clean the connections, then reflow them adding new clean solder, then clean the pads again, then test a few with the desoldering tool.  Even with flux, trying to remove original solder without at least reflowing first can make it really hard to get a clean desolder.

 

The original wave-soldering used on most of the retro computers is very effective at making sure the pins are soldered all the way through the hole, so you have to make sure the solder you are trying to remove is also liquid all the way through the hole.  Reflowing with new solder can really help with this, since provides more solder for that cushion of solder you want to keep between the pad and the desolder tool's tip.

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