SMD solder practice kits

[Robotstar5]

Mrs Robo has recently had cataracts done on both eyes, she has always worn glasses which were varifocals for the last 10 years. She is now cursing at times that she has to find and put glasses on to read as her distance vision is now perfect

 

[HughF]

I do smd rework and prototype board build as part of my day job... it's super easy to do.

I'll try and film some stuff and do a voiceover

 

[roofman]

My eyesight has been seemingly the same for years, however recently I've been struggling with close up work...been told corneas harden with age

yea thats the problem with old age..the soft bits go hard and the hard bits go soft

 

[HughF]

Fancy doing that with a soldering iron? They're leadless...

 

[HughF]

In all seriousness @Wozzaaah, start with the 1206 sized components. Place them on the pads, apply heat to one end pad, a little touch of solder will then conduct heat into the component end pad and will flow the solder. The surface tension will then cause the component to lift off the pad at the other end. Touch it with a knife blade so it goes down flat again. Then solder the other end. Excess solder can be removed with solder braid.

Lead free solder is junk for this, you need .5mm diameter lead/tin

 

[Robotstar5]

View attachment 106299
Fancy doing that with a soldering iron? They're leadless...

Blow lamp and a stick of plumbers solder should sort that

 

[MCKDAVID]

Blow lamp and a stick of plumbers solder should sort that

works for me, aye that'll be the mech techs solution, held in place with a dab of duct tape, just til it holds you understand...

 

[Wozzaaah]

Remembered I had this sat in a drawer today so what better way to round off a wet afternoon than to try out my new £20 Aldi digital soldering station than to have a bash at it.
Errmmmm..... the 1206 and 0805 weren’t too bad, the 0603 on the other hand.....
At just 1.5x0.85mm, I really struggled but.... I got them all on the board in the end, well, other than the one I lost anyway.
The most annoying thing is that the final component is a 1206 led which I fitted the wrong way round so had to remove and refit it but I managed to wreck it in the process.
The sop16 chip (which doesn’t actually do anything, as don’t the transistors) went on much better than expected, I tinned one corner pad, located it then did each leg individually.
I managed to bridge 2 legs but cleaned it up with braid.
I was probably using the wrong type of tip to be honest so most of the soldering is a bit messy but hey ho, it was fun.

 

[HughF]

Where are the pictures?

It was a bit wet today wasn't it, the wife's gazebo ended up a tangled set mess half way up the garden

 

[Pete.]

I've got a weller heat gun which is for this work but I only use it for shrink sleeving
I found it outside a building with the plug chopped off. Only reason I can think it was thrown out is because it had an asbestos sticker on it. I fitted a plug and it worked perfectly.

 

[Wozzaaah]

Where are the pictures?

It was a bit wet today wasn't it, the wife's gazebo ended up a tangled set mess half way up the garden

If I must....
errr... I think the 4 diodes might be the wrong way round too.
Oh, and I know R18 and R20 are upside down but figured they’d probably still work.
I really didn’t do very well at all, did I?

 

[HughF]

That's excellent work... I do that as part of the dayjob so I think I'm suitably qualified to comment

You should be pleased with that.

 

[Wozzaaah]

Here’s the new soldering station.
Nothing flash but the cable is nice and flexible and it feels really nice to use, much better than my old one.
Bottom 3 buttons are presets for 200, 300 and 400C, the ones on the right are temperature increase and decrease.

 

[Wozzaaah]

That's excellent work... I do that as part of the dayjob so I think I'm suitably qualified to comment

You should be pleased with that.

Considering how terrible my eyesight is and that my hands aren’t the steadiest, I am.
I quite fancy ordering a few more direct from China, they’re ridiculously cheap and as one of the deleted replies to this thread from an ex-member said, it’s actually quite therapeutic.

 

[Kayos]

I bought one of those soldering stations but not used it yet

Won’t be doing any smd work though

 

[daedalusminos]

Considering how terrible my eyesight is

If you get seriously into it you might want to consider a microscope to aid assembly.

 

[Wozzaaah]

I don’t think it’s something I’ll be doing too often to be honest, it was just something I fancied having a go at.

 

[MattF]

Well done. I've seen a damn sight worse done by people who do it for a living.

 

[graffian]

I just bought some smd LEDs to put on a the front of a webcam, going to be fun, if I get round to making a pcb.

 

[voipio]

For soldering 0402 or 0201 sized components, some sort of magnification is a must. Most of the time, I use an illuminated magnifier together with reading glasses, which doesthe trick, though a decent stereo microscope is necessary for proper inspection.