Rob Butts wrote:
I asked a question a couple of days ago about soldering small smt components. Kaimartin posted a video of someone soldering smt components [1]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQXhny3R7lk In the video the tip to the soldering iron is a shiny silver and you can see that the solder sticks to the tip.
At work, I use SN96 lead-free solder. Our irons are routinely set to 800F. These days we use Hakko irons, very nice stuff, and the iron turns off when it's in the cradle. Heat up is really quick too. Tips last me a very long time. Prior to this, we used Weller fire-starters. Sometimes the tips would turn black after a few minutes and there was no amount of cleaning, tinning or whatever that could save them. I suppose some non-brand tips are not so good - but generally they all croaked after just a short amount of time.
Although I like the sponges, sometimes people use a steel wool pad instead. I've seen pretty good results with that.
The best way to keep the tip clean - turn off the iron when not in use. Keep the temperature lower, if possible. I too have heard about globbing solder onto the tip when not in use, but have not tried it.
best luck to you :) gene _______________________________________________ geda-user mailing list geda-user@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user