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After a bit of advice please. I have been using my Mums old (pretty cheap) soldering iron, and have recently switched to another cheapy from Aldi. Both are probably about 15w.

I'm having trouple getting a decent joint, the melting of the solder is very unpredicatable, and I tend to have to take mulitple goes to get a joint to be adequate.

Is this likely to be down to my technique, or is it down to using a cheap, low powered iron? The joints hold up over time, but they look awful - worse than my welding!

I've got a few guitars to wire, and I would like to build an amp kit at some moint, so I need to improve my soldering somehow!

I have an Antex XS25 - 25w soldering iron, I use the chisel tip which came with it for soldering things like guitars up, pot lugs etc. and I got a fine point tip for it to do PCB hole through stuff for effect pedals.
Works fine for me.

You *are* cleaning the tip off on a damp sponge, yeah? 15W is on the delicate side. I have an old 35W Weller TCP station but with temperature controlled bits. Except the control doesn't seem to be working too well.

15W won't do for lead-free solder. Initially I went through a few of those 30w Antex irons and just kept the receipt and exchanged them when they died (regularly). I've got one of these things now, but a different brand, that I bought from Maplin for £60. The first iron died after about four months. So, whatever you buy, keep the receipt!

timhulio wrote:15W won't do for lead-free solder. Initially I went through a few of those 30w Antex irons and just kept the receipt and exchanged them when they died (regularly). I've got one of these things now, but a different brand, that I bought from Maplin for £60. The first iron died after about four months. So, whatever you buy, keep the receipt!

Are you restricted to lead-free solder in the UK? I experienced the same problem with the lead-free solder. I experimented with hotter irons, but was concerned that I might damage capacitors and other electronics with the increased heat, so I switched to leaded solder and it ceased to be a problem. The leaded melts like butter and is much easier to work with. I am environmentally and health conscious, but the lead-free solder left me both frustrated and worried.

Buy one of these solder stations, cheap & good

http://www.circuitspecialists.eu/solder ... 9d115c2ae1

speedfish wrote:Are you restricted to lead-free solder in the UK? I experienced the same problem with the lead-free solder. I experimented with hotter irons, but was concerned that I might damage capacitors and other electronics with the increased heat, so I switched to leaded solder and it ceased to be a problem. The leaded melts like butter and is much easier to work with. I am environmentally and health conscious, but the lead-free solder left me both frustrated and worried.

Leaded solder is much nicer to use, there's no doubt. However I do a lot of soldering, often 3-4 hours a day, and when I used to use leaded solder (building much smaller quantities of pedals) a few years ago it gave me headaches. If you're not soldering all the time I'm sure it'd be fine though.

I don't think I've ever destroyed a component due to overheating, and I rarely socket transistors.

i use an old 20w radio shack iron that was like $10. i've had two 40w that was good especially if your heating up pots in guitars, but they both died.

These last forever. Unless yours doesn't.

Different direction... UN-Soldering
What's best (easiest) to use, braid or a solder pump thing?

Solder pump I would say... and I think it's a great idea you're getting one. When I started soldering I would always screw up and would spend hours trying to remove bad solder with my iron... I think I ruined more circuits that way than any other way

For guitar circuits I'd just use the braid, a pump shines with board mounted stuff. Either are acceptable for pot lugs but if you were removing, for example, the globbed on solder on a grounded-to pot casing or something, that's more of a wick job to me in the name of cleanliness.

So it depends on the application then?

for PCB stuff - use a pump, for pots and lumpy stuff like point to point use wick.


Thanks guys.

Keep an eye on Maplin. I got one that should have been £60 for something like £25 or £30 on special. Temperature controlled and all.....