+1
Great bit of kit… I love mine.
Plus… if you ever mess one up at all with the settings, and it just doesn’t get hot enough or something is far from right…
Factory reset…
I have this one and love it. The soldering gun is a little on the cheap side, but replacements are inexpensive and readily available.
I know you said owned over a year…. And I havent, so ignore this….
I did a lot of research on this because I wanted a new machine to replace my pencil type one.
I bought an AOYUE 9378 Programmable Digital Soldering Station (60 Watt) off of eBay about a month ago for 80 bucks. I love it, It heats up so quickly and it just works. It came with 10 extra tips and an extra heating element. They have it on amazon too, but it’s a little more expensive there. There’s a lot of good reviews out there for it.
I initially was considering a Weller station, either analog or digital but the Aoyue was cheaper and had as good of reviews as the weller machines. This is BLF after all, so I went with the budget machine.
Hakko machines had a pretty good reputation as well.
+1
I use a Metcal MX500UF Solder/Rework station at work with the desolder unit as well. Very nice unit. Heats up super fast and instantly cranks up the amps when the tip is “heatsinked”.
What do you mean when the tip is “heatsinked” ?
I use a Hakko fx-888 (analog one) and am very pleased with it. I haven’t replaced the original tip yet but haven’t done a ton of soldering with it and I keep it tinned. It’s done all of my soldering since late 2012 though.
you know when you are soldering and you solder something with a large heat capacity and it sucks the heat out of the tip? sometimes even sticks it for a moment. it kind of acts like a heatsink on the soldering pen.
I got a used Hakko 936 15 years ago and it still works like new. If I ever replace it I’ll probably look at another Hakko. If you really use a soldering iron that much why not consider dropping some real money and get something REALLY good.
We use Hakko irons at work, they are used daily, 5 days a week, sometimes 10 hours a day.
Rarely would one fail, as long as the tips were tinned, we had no problems. The finest point tips tended to “oxidize” from being set too high, but 1.2 mm and larger would usually last for months before they needed to be replaced. I use a 12+ year-old Weller at home, it was a “throw-away”
when we converted to Hakko. I believe the Hakko is the model #936.
I have an 85 watt Hakko 921 iron. It is preset for 700 degrees F. Must have had it 15 years now, and have done thousands of operations with it, including leaving it on overnight more than a couple times. It heats up super fast (85 watts), but still regulates at 700 degrees. That 85 watts is good to have if you need to heat up something with some bulk—like a Noctigon.
I also had a full-on Weller soldering/desoldering station—the kind with the vacuum pump. I only had this $500+ station because it was a gift from Cooper Industries (Cooper Tools) when they bought a company of ours. I used it (the iron part) a lot, and it never missed a beat. I gave it away because of its bulk—I hardly ever desolder, and the Hakko took up way less space on my bench.
Hakko and Weller. Both are top notch IMO.
Oh, that! H)
You got me goggling the term and found out that some people put some sort of thermal grease on the base of the soldering tips to maximize heat transfer from the heating element to the tip. haven’t heard of this before, and haven’t read much if it would be OK for the tip or the heating element in the long run…
This is the thermal compound some were suggesting, it is rated at up to 1000 Celsius.
At a guess, Id say its primary purpose is to keep the bits free and removable without too much hassle, a bit like exhaust bolts on a car. The heat transfer is no different to heat transfer here re: LEDs and thats been overly discussed already. Better than nothing, maybe, and less is more, sure, but in the end its best use is to keep stuff that heats and cools reasonably easy to remove.
Well, I can only report on what I've actually used. I started with one of the cheap HobbyKing Hakko 936 and I am still using it today despite heavy use. I also have an FX-888D. The genuine Hakko has a better (more comfortable) iron and iron holder, but besides that it really isn't very much more powerful.
I use genuine Hakko tips with both irons and am satisfied with both of them. To me, the tips are more important than the iron.
I never expected the $21 iron to last for thousands of hours, but it has. The Hakko is a little more comfortable to use, but it was $70 more.
I think that the Hakko will serve you well, but many others probably would as well.
oh my gosh V.O.B. I will freely admit I read none of the replies. But I have been using this station heavily for at least 8 years, probably more without a hicup.
http://www.weller-toolsus.com/soldering/systems/wes-series/weller-wesd51-soldering-station-digital-50w-120v-eta.html
And it’s only a 50 watt unit. Money well spent.
Yes. This.
I have the Second one you linked. I thought the wand would break right away but it still works fine. It was delivered with a cold joint in one of the connections to the heating element (kept displaying E5) but after fixing that it’s held up well. Two minor complaints; the tip holder comes loose and the wand base needed a loop of Romex to hold the pen up. I use tip #1 for most things but like #3 for making flat joints on mcpcb’s.
Note, I said flat not fat.
I used to work for Metcal aka OK industries we though our were the best built. we were catering to PCB production rework but the machines were still for individual stations.
I have a Pace ST115 for maybe 10 years now, never had any problem with it.
I have a Aouye Int3210 soldering station. -> http://www.aoyue.com/en/product/default.asp?id=39
Not the cheapest one (85€ in germany), but I have it now for ~5 Years and never had a problem with it.
very flexible cable, fast heating, digital display, shuts itself down if you forget it - and the tip is still the first one.