New Soldering Iron Day...
My 18w Antex crapped out, dead heating element... I went to Maplin during the day and found a 15w with a nice point that had been used... so I took it to the counter and said "it's been used but I like the bit" - he went to the stock brought a new one out and found the bit was different... so he took the tip off the new one, slid on the tip I wanted, knocked off £3 and we were both happy.
I love this iron! It's so much lighter, delicate - I'm seeing improvements in my soldering already
I took it home and built a Pedalparts Orange Squeezer - now I've a lot of experience with this pedal as I've made 3 now... this one has a 1n4148 diode in it and seems quieter and less twangy... I'll be swapping out the diode post haste, also may replace the taller components - the trim pot and the 47 uF elec capacitor or it's never going to fit in a 1590a
A sig-nat-eur? What am I meant to use this for ffs?! Is this thing recording?
Comments
I managed to successfully build a Fuzz pedal with the 4) watter. How on earth, I've no idea...
but when I'm striving to get solder joints as purty as @juansolo 's:
Almost as good as my old Weller one wot I bought for College/Uni. Time will tell though.
As Chilli says a solder station should last years and my last two are still going in new lives. the Weller is of 80's vintage and still going strong.
Over that time small mains and GAS soldering irons have come and gone in disturbing numbers.
Next is an SMD workstation hopefully this year or the next.
Good GAS lads!
Just realised how cool we are, discussing the virtues of soldering irons.
Interested in the brass wool cleaners - is there a reason not to use steel wool?
I used to use fairly coarse stuff on my old iron when it got really bad, but since getting a proper sponge and cleaning regularly, I've not needed it.