Prepping & Maintaining Your Brand New Soldering Iron

[P90]

the stainless will almost last forever, because the solder wont stick to it.

the reason for the brass is that it's a softer metal and thus less likely to damage the iron plating on the tip.
if you're going to use ss, might as well use 40 sandpaper...   

The Hakko and clone tips haven't complained about stainless yet and I consider a highly efficient tip cleaning method and the time it saves more important than the cost of tips.
The value of your time might be different. 

whatever floats your boat... 

[macboy]

30 years ago, after i attempted (and failed) to tin my first soldering iron tip, I figured out the right way to do it. What I did wrong of course was to let the iron get up to full hot temperature before attempting to apply solder. Even the Kester 44 flux couldn't manage to get through that black oxidized iron plating. The next time, I applied solder right from cold, and as soon as the tip was hot enough to melt it, it flowed over the tip like melted butter.

I've used a damp (never wet) sponge for tip cleaning all these years without damage. I've used some of my tips for over a decade. The key to longevity IMHO is minimizing mechanical stress. Never press hard; it's never necessary for thermal transfer, and if you feel it is, then something else is wrong. Never use the tip as a prybar to lift bent-over component leads. Usually, it's when mechanical stresses cause a hole or crack in the plating that the tip is toast. Solder gets in, dissolves the copper in relatively short order, and then it's nothing but a iron shell doomed to fail at any moment.