Let's see your soldering irons..

[teletekman]

Random question for all those that use soldering irons, and stations.

Do you guys use different tips for the various bits of work that you do, and if so, what would you regards as your most commonly used tips?

If you have stations, what additional parts would you buy to keep as spares when replacement is necessary?

As I said in an earlier post, I'm buying a few bits and bobs, debating on buying a set of tips or individual ones, as well as a replacement heating element/holder/barrell, don't want to buy a bunch I'll never use! lol Thanks for your help in advance.

It all depends on what type of job you are doing as to what size tip you will need. If you are working on circuit boards with mostly SMT components as small as 0603 or even 0402, you will benefit greatly from using smaller more precise conical tips. True they will not transfer the heat as quick but when you are using a fine gauge solder such as .015 or even .010, you don't need to apply large amounts of heat as your working area is not large to begin with. If this is just to be used around the house on normal everyday projects, (pieces of wire 18G & larger, standard through-hole components or even using your iron to melt plastic) yes the broader tips such as your spade or even larger chisel head tips will work great. Most irons will come wih some type of standard conical tip which my HAKO iron has and that I use quite a bit for working on automotive projects. And if you are buying solder from the local hardware store, most of the time you will probably not go any lower than about .030 which is pretty common around the home or garage so here is where the larger tips will come to play.

Here are a couple of links with different style tips that are pretty widely used from different manufactures...

http://www.arcade-electronics.com/Weller/PTseriesTips.jpg

http://img.alibaba.com/img/pb/911/739/276/276739911_572.jpg

 

[Ancient Iron]

I have a Wen 199k that was my fathers.I think my mom got it for him with S and M Green stamps back in the late 1960's I need new tips for it I can't seem to find them

 

[Outlawmws]

I have a Wen 199k that was my fathers.I think my mom got it for him with S and M Green stamps back in the late 1960's I need new tips for it I can't seem to find them

Maybe just get a Weller tip and bend it to fit?

 

[Ancient Iron]

Maybe just get a Weller tip and bend it to fit?

I'll give it a try Thankyou

 

[lilredex]

For anyone out there near Cedar Rapids..

http://cedarrapids.craigslist.org/atq/2995864592.html

 

[lilredex]

This is my first soldering iron from 1956 or so..

An early import from the seventies, heats up fast. Good for wiring jobs.

A cast iron solder pot, age UNK.

Also have a Weller gun from the sixties and a few of the old style manual heated types...can't see them at the moment.

 

[TOOLFREEQ]

chisel tips are prob the most versitile

 

[EOC_Jason]

My go-to soldering iron is usually a Weller WES51. I also have lots of tips depending on what I'm trying to do. For soldering big wires I have one of those two-stage irons, I think mine happens to be a radio shack model. I do have a bunch of older cheap-o fixed wattage irons in my drawer but I never use them. Those are the ones I loan out to people that need to borrow a soldering iron...

+1 for lead free *****.... tin whiskers **** too, but easy enough to fix.

 

[Outlander]

These 2 are the ones I have handy - Weller 8200 and a 30W iron. There are a couple more at my city place, I probably need to balance them out better across my tool boxes.

This thread was filled with neat tools and brought back memories of learning electronics with my uncle (RIP).

 

[rodm1]

This is the model I have.

 

[rshadd]

Weller WESD51 Soldering Station


Weller Portasol




Ungar 776 Soldering Iron (red handle)


Nokorode Soldering Paste

 

[oldtools]

I have a no name brand and an old Weller. I just bought about 200 Metcal soldering tips for 25 cents a piece. Now I need to go buy myself a Metcal workstation.

 

[Drunken Yak inc]

A stock photo of the one I have:

 

[MaximRecoil]

This is the model I have.

That's as good as it gets, as far as I'm concerned. Here's my Metcal STSS:

I soldered approximately 4 million joints with Metcal STSS and MX-500 soldering stations when I worked at a PCB factory from 1997 to 1999. I wouldn't want to use anything else. The STTC-126 is my preferred tip cartridge for most applications.