From: Michael O'Quinn <michael_at_oquinn.info>
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2003 15:05:32 -0700 (PDT)

On Fri, 11 Apr 2003, Linus Nielsen Feltzing wrote:

> TP Diffenbach wrote:
> > How exactly do you know when you're overheating everything else?
>
> Well, things start melting...

And the little popping sounds the components make as they explode is
usually a pretty good clue...

More seriously, if it takes more than a few seconds to do the job, that
usually means the heat is getting sucked away and something that shouldn't
be hot is getting hot. This is one case where too small (wattage wise) a
soldering iron can cause damage.

The advantage of a temperature controlled soldering iron is that it (1)
never gets hotter than you set it, but (2) is still able to pump a lot of
heat in a very short time, which helps you melt just the solder you want
without waiting around long enough to heat up everything else.

Since I don't have a temp-controlled soldering iron, I sometimes have to
use a higher wattage or a bigger tip (more copper = more heat stored in
the tip = not as good as a temp-controlled but better than a small tip)
than is usually recommended.

Not for the faint of heart.

Michael
Received on 2003-04-12