Is there such a thing as a cheap solder that's good for practice/learning?

[Cyber Akuma]

The popular/good solders are well-known, the tin/lead mixes from MG Chemicals, Kester, and Multicore (although I can't seem to find that last one anymore).
 
I am going to buy several $0.50 - $2 solder-practice boards from Aliexpress to help learn to solder before doing any of the DIY projects I am planning to do... but I don't want to use up expensive solder just building simple junk that just lights up, tells the time, or makes beeping noises that I will only be building for the sake of getting practice soldering.
 
Is there any cheap solder that is still of passable quality and "good enough" to waste on those cheap practice boards just for the sake of learning to solder? Or is that a bad idea and I should start learning with the more expensive good solder instead of developing my skills from the start with a lower quality cheaper one?  I saw this Maiyum brand that I thought was supposed to be good, and it was cheap, but then I saw it listed as one of the crappy cheap solders, yet I also see it used frequently in soldering tutorials/repair videos.
 
Are there any cheap brands one can recommend for one to start learning to solder that I can waste on those cheap practice boards I mentioned? Or would this make me learn the wrong things if I didn't start with the more expensive solder right again?

[ataradov]

Don't worry about "wasting" it. Solder is not a thing you should be really worried about, unless you soldering A LOT, a typical spool will last you a long time. You will need to solder 100s of those kits to spend it all.

It is far more economical to buy good solder and forget about it for a long time.

[Ian.M]

Bad solder can even give a pro technician a hard time getting even barely acceptable joints.  There isn't much that can be done to make good solder cheaper except make and sell more of it to reduce overheads, as it *MUST* contain the same proportions of the same component metals to meet the specs for whatever solder alloy it is, and reducing the proportion of flux core rapidly reduces solderability.

Fake solder typically is *NOT* the alloy it claims to be as Tin is relatively expensive, and the 'flux' core - if any - is unlikely to be effective as any rosin (already the cheapest effective flux) it contains will be stretched by large proportions of grease, wax or even waxy recycled plastic, none of which improve solderability.

Also bad solder with corrosive flux can rapidly damage your soldering iron's tip, and the cost of tip replacement is likely to be far higher than any savings on solder cost.

TLDR: Buy a brand of solder you trust from a supplier you trust, preferably with a physical presence in your country so they respect local consumer law, as it will be cheaper in the long run!

[Cyber Akuma]

TLDR: Buy a brand of solder you trust from a supplier you trust, preferably with a physical presence in your country so they respect local consumer law, as it will be cheaper in the long run!

So then I should not use Amazon? What would even be a good supplier for Illinois, USA? I tried going to some hardware stores and they had random solder brands I had never heard of.

[ataradov]

Hardware stores usually have stuff for plumbing, not electronics. Definitely don't use that.

Amazon is fine. You are really overthinking it. I have not heard or seen solder being faked. It is not impossible, of course. You can go to more specialty suppliers if you want to be sure. Something like this https://www.tequipment.net/MG-Chemicals/4884-227G/Solder-Wire/?v=0. It will be a bit more expensive, but again, you are not going to use that in a log time. Obviously pick lead free version if you prefer that. For hobby I would not bother.

[fourfathom]

Yes, buy the good stuff, and Amazon is fine.  I bought this Kester solder through Amazon, and it's fine: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004L4VHJE/ (it's tin/lead).  Don't buy off-brand solder, it's likely to give you nothing but grief.

[Ian.M]

Amazon is a US based multinational, with major assets in most of the countries it serves, so has reasonably good consumer protection - if you order a western brand name product fulfilled by Amazon, and its fake or otherwise clearly defective, you *WILL* get your money back fairly quickly, provided you follow their (free) returns process. 

The same cannot be said for various far East eBazaars, where the sellers identities morph at the drop of a hat, after doing their best to trick you into timing out your claim, and they have no assets in your country to make them respect your consumer law.

[IanB]

Hardware stores usually have stuff for plumbing, not electronics. Definitely don't use that.

You can get rosin core electrical solder at Home Depot, for example, but it is going to be lead free solder and expensive (e.g. $17 for a 3 oz spool).

[AndyBeez]

You ask, is there such a thing as a cheap solder that's good for practice/learning? Straight answer, no. All cheap solder will teach you is how to make bad solder joints. With good quality solder and a clean soldering iron tip, you will become a proficient technician. Spend more, learn more.

You might find on ebay, people selling off their surplus solder, etc,

[nightfire]

My 2 Cents on learning something basic skills that will be crucial to later work: DO not skimp too much on quality, unless you are really money-restricted or are willing to spend overproportionally time on something.

Reason: When you learn something new and have to get some practice at it, all variations should be reduced to one - the one you are currently working to improve.
Means in your case: Use the same soldering iron, same boards, same solder so that your skills alone are the only thing you  will vary to get some experience.
This means also that the abovementioned stuff has to come in consistent quality to NOT introduce some variations to the things you do.

And when you use very low quality stuff to work with, you will spend lots of (unnecessary) time to figure out what is going wrong or at least sub-par.
So your question to go for decent, not overly expensive tools is legit, but given the overall costs of a spool of decent quality solder that will last until the soldering skills are solid, there is not much to save.

Just looked at amazon US, and I understand the question: On a search for "solder wire" lots of chinese "fantasy" brands with random names came up, not much brands that I would recognize as well-known.
One sprung to me:
Weller WSW SnPb (T0051403099) Solder Wire, Dia: 1.0 mm / 0.039 in, Wt: 100 g / 3.527 oz, Alloy Sn60Pb40, Flux content 2.2% 

These 100g should last a while, at least it should be very sufficient to get your skills trained so that you are capable of getting some feel for your iron, reheating time, behaviour of solder when tinning bigger areas etc.
For US residents, that are not affected by regulations regarding lead-free solder, this is probably a very good point to begin with- the classic 60/40 solder mixture with flux included in the wire.
Also the 1mm diameter makes it melt quickly, but produces enough amounts of solder to get THT stuff done easily- and with the length of wire you have to feed to the soldering iron you get a good feel how much stuff to use.

[tooki]

As others already said: Amazon USA carries (some) Kester products at pretty good prices, and I have yet to try any solder brand that is better than Kester.

I’d recommend this one instead: https://www.amazon.com/KESTER-SOLDER-24-6337-0027-Solder-183%C2%B0C/dp/B09DQ6ZK42/

That exact one is my “daily driver” solder at home. It’s 63/37 (which is slightly better than 60/40, because as a true eutectic solder, it solidifies instantly without a “slushy” state where the joint can be disturbed) and it’s 0.8mm, which I find to be my favorite size (the other is 0.5mm, which is my second-favorite size. But IMHO that’s too thin for many things.)

Don’t worry about not finding Multicore brand: I frankly haven’t been super impressed by it. I like Kester better.

[fourfathom]

Yes, solder diameter should ideally be matched to the job.  I have "fat" and "skinny" solder at my bench, and switch between them depending on what I'm soldering.  But for starting out a good medium size should do the job -- tooki's recommendation sounds good, I think my recommendation (0.5mm) was skinnier than necessary.

[Kleinstein]

With electronics one usually only needs rather little solder. The problem is more getting the right solder type in small enough a quantety. Some 20 g can last for years to come. Ideally one would have even versions with different fluxes / diameter. Often one can get away with a relatively thin (0.5-0.8 mm) diameter and mild, no clean flux. If more agressive flux is needed (oxidized, harder so solder parts) one can add some separately. With SMD parts / practicing / repairs one may want some separate flux anyway.

Not sure it really makes sense to use extra soldering practice boards. One could as well start with simpler projects with not too expensive parts. There are quite some relatively cheap kits around. The first ones may not look pretty, but who really cares.

[rstofer]

I have been working through a 1 pound  spool of Kester 60/40 .025" diameter solder for the last 20 years.

I'm not hung up on 60/40 vs 63/37

https://www.amazon.com/Kester-44-Lead-Solder-Wire/dp/B0032UZ80W

It looks like MultiCore is now a Locktite product

https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/multicore/386824/2498902

[Cyber Akuma]

Well, in terms of good solder, these are the two I was considering:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005T8N1QI/

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00068IJPO/

Probably would start with the first one just because it's cheaper

EDIT: What the? The first one used to be $20 for half a pound, now it's $30, same price as one pound.

[bidrohini]

Solder lead with 60% alloy is cheap. For learning purposes, it is good.

[tggzzz]

Are there any cheap brands one can recommend for one to start learning to solder that I can waste on those cheap practice boards I mentioned? Or would this make me learn the wrong things if I didn't start with the more expensive solder right again?

As.others have said, get the appropriate solder and learn how to use that.the

The best an-initio soldering tutorials I have seen are the very old PACE videos on yoootooob. They were made when it was expensive to make and distribute and watch lessons. That means they are terse, informative, take care to show how it is done correctly and incorrectly.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL926EC0F1F93C1837

https://bristol.hackspace.org.uk/wiki/doku.php?id=resources:pcb

[rstofer]

While you're at it, look for videos on SMD soldering using a hotplate or converted toaster oven for SMD soldering.

Howard Electronics has nice solder paste and flux paste:

https://www.howardelectronics.com/smd-rework/chip-quik-low-temp-smd-rework/smd291/chip-quik-smd291-flux-10cc-syringe/
https://www.howardelectronics.com/specialty/solder-flux/chip-quik-thermally-stable-solder-paste-nc-no-clean-sn63-pb37-t4-35g-syringe/

You also need at least 2 sizes of SolderWick.  Maybe get an assortment to start and refill the sizes you use the most:

https://www.amazon.com/Hotop-No-Clean-Braided-Desoldering-Multi-color/dp/B0987HK6R1

Hint:  when you have solder bridges, SolderWick is your best friend.  Sometimes the bridge is on the backside and you can't quite reach it with the wick.  Flux helps in this case.  The solder will flow and break the bridge.  I sometimes add a little flux to the wick.  Especially older wick...

While you are watching videos, pay particular attention to 'drag soldering'.  This is another opportunity to use paste flux.  Put a strip of flux along the entire sides over pads and PCB.  Place the part, tack a couple of corners and drag the rest.  It works perfectly!

Pay attention to the details in this video:

https://youtu.be/nyele3CIs-U

There's a lot of learning in this short video...

Did you pick up on the type of soldering iron tip?  It's kind of a club foot like the right-most 2 in this photo:

https://www.amazon.com/Soldering-Tabiger-X-Tronic-Station-Different/dp/B077V1VND5

I just use my small chisel tip but it takes more solder applications to the tip while running down the sides.  It measures about 3/32" so about 2mm.  I use it for everything.  I have a kit of tips I have never used!

[tkamiya]

Please don't use cheap solder.  It will give you so much trouble.

If you are tight on budget, please send me a PM.  I'll send you some of my favorite.  Kester 63/37 with no clean flux.

[ataradov]

EDIT: What the? The first one used to be $20 for half a pound, now it's $30, same price as one pound.

Miracles of automated pricing.

I went to my orders. The 1/2 lb spool I currently use is this https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005T8N8B6/ it was purchased in 2016. And I solder quite a bit. It is low, so I would need to get a new one soon, but it still lasted 5+ years. So, I would not worry about longevity. You really don't use much if you are not doing mass production,

[fourfathom]

And *DON'T* get cheap solder-wick.  Some of that stuff is so bad that you couldn't solder to it if you tried, let alone have it actually wick up solder as it's supposed to.  I recently got this Chemtronics wick from Amazon, and it's good: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0019V5MAC

[tooki]

Well, in terms of good solder, these are the two I was considering:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005T8N1QI/

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00068IJPO/

Probably would start with the first one just because it's cheaper

EDIT: What the? The first one used to be $20 for half a pound, now it's $30, same price as one pound.

The first one is just 1/2lb, so even at $25 it's actually more expensive.

But I wouldn't buy either of those: the 63/37 I linked to above is better than the 60/40 but actually costs LESS.

Here it is again: https://www.amazon.com/KESTER-SOLDER-24-6337-0027-Solder-183%C2%B0C/dp/B09DQ6ZK42/

[tooki]

And *DON'T* get cheap solder-wick.  Some of that stuff is so bad that you couldn't solder to it if you tried, let alone have it actually wick up solder as it's supposed to.  I recently got this Chemtronics wick from Amazon, and it's good: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0019V5MAC

MG Chemicals wick is cheaper and significantly better IMHO. (It's got a much finer weave.)

[tooki]

Solder lead with 60% alloy is cheap. For learning purposes, it is good.

60/40 used to be a tiny bit cheaper than 63/37, and performs nearly as well, so it used to be very popular. These days, the majority of solder is lead-free, so both 63/37 and 60/40 are made in much smaller quantities than before, so the price difference has evaporated.
As I show above, the Kester 63/37 actually costs less than the 60/40.

Also, I fundamentally disagree with the concept of using different material "for learning purposes". What's the point of using stuff that's different than what you actually want to use in the end? Especially if you mean using no-name crap, which is so unpredictable as to be useless for learning.

[Cyber Akuma]

And *DON'T* get cheap solder-wick.  Some of that stuff is so bad that you couldn't solder to it if you tried, let alone have it actually wick up solder as it's supposed to.  I recently got this Chemtronics wick from Amazon, and it's good: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0019V5MAC

I already got some of this wick: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00424MWHO/

[Cyber Akuma]

But I wouldn't buy either of those: the 63/37 I linked to above is better than the 60/40 but actually costs LESS.

Here it is again: https://www.amazon.com/KESTER-SOLDER-24-6337-0027-Solder-183%C2%B0C/dp/B09DQ6ZK42/

I forgot to mention, is that diameter more suited for through-hold, or for smaller SMD components? Another reason I was looking at those two was that the first one has a smaller diameter. I wanted to start out first on through-hole practice boards, and then once I have familiarity with some basics of soldering try to use some SMD practice soldering boards. Would that 0.025 dimeter one I posted be more useful for smaller component smd soldering? Would it be too small for through-hole components? Would the other 0.031 diameter one be too big for SMD?

[ataradov]

It does not matter that much, it is mostly a matter of personal preference and generally all those < 1 mm diameters will be suitable. By the time solder is anywhere near the component, it is molten in a blob.

I personally just go for 0.025, it is not too thin, not too thick.

If I were assembling some massive quantities of though hole components, I'd probably go fo something thicker, since through hole components take a lot of solder and it gets annoying to feed a lot of thin solder. But for hobby stuff, it is manageable.

[Nusa]

You can always cut a length off and double it up if you have a situation that calls for thicker solder.

[rsjsouza]

If you are near the Westmont area in Illinois, Microcenter has a brick-and-mortar store

https://www.microcenter.com/site/stores/westmont.aspx

They carry several brands and are well worth paying a visit, as they also have a lot more w.r.t. kits, parts and tools for electronics.

[Cyber Akuma]

If you are near the Westmont area in Illinois, Microcenter has a brick-and-mortar store

https://www.microcenter.com/site/stores/westmont.aspx

They carry several brands and are well worth paying a visit, as they also have a lot more w.r.t. kits, parts and tools for electronics.

I was at a Microcenter recently, it's there I got my Hakko soldering iron since it was on sale, but I didn't recognize any of the solder brands other than MG Chemicals that only came in tiny tubes that cost a lot more than on Amazon.