Soldering Iron / Station recommendations

[airborne]

about half a year ago my grandma's reading lamp had a cord fail and she asked me to fix it ...

i then realized i forgot my Radio Shack soldering gun at my pops' place ...

but when i went to research my options i realized i was drawn to stuff that was orders of magnitude more expensive than my old Radio Shack that worked fine ...

so i just gave grandma a different lamp and her lamp is still not fixed because i still haven't picked a replacement soldering solution ...

i should say that i almost never solder electronics - i mostly solder things like DIY interconnects, power cables, speaker terminals etc ...

this is why i have been using the Radio Shack gun which although very crude never the less allowed me to do everything i needed ...

i could get a similar gun for about $20 or a better Weller gun for about $40 but i'm really drawn to a high power Weller soldering station which has both the power to solder heavy gauge wire and the precision to solder electronics ... except it's over $500 ...

Weller seems unique in that it offers multiple technologies of tips and irons that work with the same station. So you can use an expensive but low power active tip iron for SMD work ( not that i ever would, but you can ) and a big dumb but really powerful iron for soldering power cords and they both plug into the same station.

or is there nothing unique about this ?

what would you recommend ?

 

[Prana Ferox]

If you want to solder electronics:
Look on Parts Express for the obvious Weller-knockoff Stahls, they go on sale a lot and it's not hard to find coupons for a few bucks more off. At a bare minimum get something that lets you dial in a specific temperature (not just an unmarked hot-cold knob) and has indication that it's at temperature or not. I use this one (which admittedly I think I bought for half that price) but if I was buying today I'd get this one since it's only a few bucks more.

You also want to think about how you're going to (negatively) ventilate your workspace because you don't want to be bending over a hot iron inhaling the crap from the solder and flux very long.

If you want to solder power cords, just get something cheap with high wattage that you can throw in a bag. The stuff you're soldering may or may not be practical to bring back to your workbench anyway.

 

[RandomEar]

I recently looked into a new iron, too. DC powered options like the Miniware ts100 and the Pine64 Pinecil are currently extremely popular in the maker community. They both use the same active tips (lots of options, fair priced), deliver around 60 W max power when using a 20 V PSU and seem to be super easy to use. The temperature is PID-controlled, like on soldering stations.

I still haven't bought one, because there wasn't much to solder in the past months. Therefore, I can't personally vouch for their quality. But I thought I'd mention them because they appear to be innovative tools.

 

[airborne]

If you want to solder electronics:
Look on Parts Express for the obvious Weller-knockoff Stahls, they go on sale a lot and it's not hard to find coupons for a few bucks more off. At a bare minimum get something that lets you dial in a specific temperature (not just an unmarked hot-cold knob) and has indication that it's at temperature or not. I use this one (which admittedly I think I bought for half that price) but if I was buying today I'd get this one since it's only a few bucks more.

You also want to think about how you're going to (negatively) ventilate your workspace because you don't want to be bending over a hot iron inhaling the crap from the solder and flux very long.

If you want to solder power cords, just get something cheap with high wattage that you can throw in a bag. The stuff you're soldering may or may not be practical to bring back to your workbench anyway.

the unit you recommend seems to be 48W iron and it doesn't seem to say if you can use a different gun or tip with it etc ...

the radio shack gun was 100W and on some bigger power cables it was barely enough ... though an iron and gun may deliver heat differently ...

but mostly it's the flexibility aspect - to me if you can't change the irons why even go with a station ? there are irons that have built in temperature adjustment.

can you swap different irons with this Stahl ? how high can you go on watts ?

 

[airborne]

I recently looked into a new iron, too. DC powered options like the Miniware ts100 and the Pine64 Pinecil are currently extremely popular in the maker community. They both use the same active tips (lots of options, fair priced), deliver around 60 W max power when using a 20 V PSU and seem to be super easy to use. The temperature is PID-controlled, like on soldering stations.

I still haven't bought one, because there wasn't much to solder in the past months. Therefore, I can't personally vouch for their quality. But I thought I'd mention them because they appear to be innovative tools.

yes i seen those but to me the only benefit they offer over a station is portability.

if you're doing a car audio system for example perhaps a weller station might be cumbersome even though you could hook it up to 12V with an inverter.

i'm just not sure what exactly is the innovation in these USB pens ? or why would you want buttons all over your iron that can be accidentally pressed etc. or why would you want to deal with flimsy usb ports at the limit of their power rating.

every time a new technology comes out whether it is LEDs or 3D printing or Electric Cars or USB or Crypto or NFT there are entrepreneurs who see it as their opportunity ... and rightfully so ... but that doesn't mean what they end up creating is actually useful.

IMO anyway ...

 

[Killingbeans]

I use a Weller PU 81 with a WP 65 iron. Rock solid combo.

 

[JeffS7444]

i should say that i almost never solder electronics - i mostly solder things like DIY interconnects, power cables, speaker terminals etc ...

this is why i have been using the Radio Shack gun which although very crude never the less allowed me to do everything i needed ...

i could get a similar gun for about $20 or a better Weller gun for about $40 but i'm really drawn to a high power Weller soldering station which has both the power to solder heavy gauge wire and the precision to solder electronics ... except it's over $500 ...

Weller seems unique in that it offers multiple technologies of tips and irons that work with the same station. So you can use an expensive but low power active tip iron for SMD work ( not that i ever would, but you can ) and a big dumb but really powerful iron for soldering power cords and they both plug into the same station.

or is there nothing unique about this ?

For occasional soldering of cables and non SMD electronics, Hakko's FX888D would already be super-nice at a fraction of the price. Also check out Weller WE1010-series station, which looks like today's equivalent of the ancient WTCPN which served me brilliantly from the 1980s until only last year (and which is still in demand on eBay!).

 

[Lambda]

Wella is sadly no more they ust sell out the name and the good image but There products are stuck in the 90s and quality is gone downhill.

Get a ts100 or pinecil and be happy.
The heating element directly integrated in the Tip makes a Day and night different

 

[Ricardus]

These threads are largely pointless because you'll get 50 recommendations with people swearing by them.

BUT, that said, I bought a Hakko FX888D about 9 or 10 years ago, and I could list all of the recording equipment I've built with it in that time, but I'll spare you that, and just say I swear by it.

I have about 8 different tips from small to large. I use the smallest ones to build discrete opamps and for soldering things like Grayhill switch contacts, and I used the bigger ones for point to point repair work. It maintains its temp all the time and has done a fantastic job.

Do with that what you will.

 

[JeffS7444]

One of the joys of buying industry-standard tools is being able to readily buy new heating elements and tips for a soldering station you bought a couple of decades prior.

 

[Prana Ferox]

can you swap different irons with this Stahl ? how high can you go on watts ?

The Stahls are Weller knockoffs. You can swap out the irons and the tips, and there are a couple options on PE. I suspect they're parts-interchangeable with Weller / other knockoffs but don't quote me on that.

Again, if you're doing delicate work you want temperature control. If you're just landing power cords, you want wattage. The Stahl station I have has come up short for me trying to solder directly to big binding posts, but it's the wrong tool for that job.

 

[JeffS7444]

Get a ts100 or pinecil and be happy.

First reaction was to burst out laughing at the notion of a soldering iron with RISC processor, OLED display and user tweakable operating system. But it's tiny and at the price, seems almost like a giveaway.

 

[Ricardus]

One of the joys of buying industry-standard tools is being able to readily buy new heating elements and tips for a soldering station you bought a couple of decades prior.

Yup. I've gotten tips for my Hakko from Amazon, Grainger, and Home Depot.

 

[DonH56]

Weller, Hakko, Metcal for me (OK, the Metcal is at work, not something I bought personally, but it's a nice beast ).

 

[Lambda]

First reaction was to burst out laughing at the notion of a soldering iron with RISC processor, OLED display and user tweakable operating system. But it's tiny and at the price, seems almost like a giveaway.

It also has a Gyroscope and ACC... and yes you can run games on it. In this century why not.
But the TS100 Performs excellent and is way faster compered to my 15year old Welle or Ersa stations.

 

[DVDdoug]

For the lamp you'll want something with higher wattage and a big tip (like your Radio Shack Gun). The mass of the tip holds the heat so it's not just wattage. A low-wattage iron obviously gets hot enough to melt solder but it's more difficult to get that heat into whatever you are soldering. (I think I have a Radio Shack soldering gun.... I know it's not a Weller.. I'd forgotten I had it 'till you reminded me.)

For electronic soldering I used those cheap $2 or $3 Radio Shack irons for many years and I've gone-through 3 or 4 of them.

Then a few years ago, I wanted something with a smaller tip so I bought a 40W Weller that has adjustable temperature (with no temperature display) and it accepts different tips. I think I paid between $50 and $100.

 

[airborne]

Wella is sadly no more they ust sell out the name and the good image but There products are stuck in the 90s and quality is gone downhill.

Get a ts100 or pinecil and be happy.
The heating element directly integrated in the Tip makes a Day and night different

weller has active tip irons as well ...

 

[JeffS7444]

weller has active tip irons as well ...

*Cough* that's getting kind of fancy for soldering the occasional lamp wire or interconnect, no? Old-school thermostatic control works very well for most general purpose tasks, and can be pressed into light SMD duty, though the flood-and-solder-wick technique is a bit more labor intensive. But for working with the occasional SOIC opamp, it's fine.

Traditional solder station likes: Generally includes a stand, some means of cleaning the tips, and handset cords will typically be made from burn-resistant material, like silicone.

Don't get me wrong: I love the best of the new tech, and in fact, upgraded to Hakko's FX951. Really love how I can breeze through soldering and desoldering 30 gauge wires with minimal heat damage to the insulation. But my emphasis is more on smaller-scale stuff like camera repair + SMD.

 

[JeffS7444]

It also has a Gyroscope and ACC... and yes you can run games on it. In this century why not.

Newer, hotter trend is to say "But we won't": "Curated" goods and services often sell for more money

 

[Killingbeans]

Weller, Hakko, Metcal for me (OK, the Metcal is at work, not something I bought personally, but it's a nice beast ).

The Metcal stations is one of the few things I really miss from one of my old workplaces. We also had a Metcal desolder gun hooked up to a huge dedicated compressor. That thing seriously sucked... in a good way.