I had not much time, my heatblock with well-controlled temperature takes half an hour to warm up and this worked:
Yes, that’s how I do it. Initially I used too much heat and the LED and board would smoke. Lol! It’s always so nice to finally see the LED float and shift into place ;D
Same here. Had to go through quite a few smoked PCBs though. It heats up too fast.
Seems risky. Easy to heat it up too much.
What is wrong with a cooking plate?
Risky, but there is something really cool about using actual real fire to build part of a light.
did you put solderpaste on the noctigon?
While camping, I used a propane lighter and a pair or needle nosed pliers to reflow with perfect results. As the mcpcb heats up, just hold the flame further away and then remove it when the solder liquifies.
You do a lot of reflowing while camping?
Wow 18 seconds!
I also have done this a couple of time, works really fast…I found out that it is easier with noctigons than sinkpads because sinkpads easyly loosens the top layer if you apply to much heat.
This CREE PDF on reflowing might be of interest:
http://www.cree.com/xlamp_app_notes/xm_sh
(Page 8 is very useful)
It's not the heat, it's the skill of the user. Cree leds take a lot of heat.
Lot's more than the spec sheet states. Ask me how I know.
Until I got the Hot Air machine, I did them all with a soldering iron.
Never had one failure, after I learned how hot is hot, that is.
Just takes a little practice. Using the leds that you take out of a light and are not going to use again, is a good way to practice different ways of reflow.
Every chance I get! 
Ive done 4 or 5 with a lighter and its actually quite easy.
Not arguing with you or saying your wrong, I’m sure we all have different experiences and techniques, but I’ve foind the opposite. SinkPAD ’s can handle the heat better than Noctigon.
I reflow on a glass cook top.
it was pre-tinned by a former led.
I was curious if this would work and placed a phone camera next to it. It must be very easy to kill a led this way but I was fast enough :-)
I did not follow that curve, did I ? :bigsmile:
I think you might have been a little bit off.. :D
BTW djozz, my flame is set less than half the size of yours. Good stuff man!
I knew i had made something like this but never uploaded it until now.
Those noctigons conduct heat so well. I noticed those boards from oshpark do too- like if you want to solder something big you better not have anything connected to the positive terminal… That’ll conduct all the way down the chain before your part actually heats
It’s all in the eye- you can see when it’s ready
Cool! The mellow version with appropriate music, thanks for posting :bigsmile: