Soldering irons: single-watt vs. temp. control

[13hm13]

Been using a Hakko FX-888D for about a little over two years. Maybe 1-2 hrs every week (max). Not sure about tip "odometer" hours, but I'm still on my orig. tip---[edit] apart from a little side bar a few hours ago. Almost always use default 750 degree temp. [edit: THIS MAY BE TOO HIGH FOR MY DEFAULT  Kester 66/44 sn63pb37 ] Use tip tinner or solder for wetting. And use only brass wire for cleaning (no sponge).

Before, I was using 25- and 35-watt tradit. electric irons (Weller and Hakko). Same soldering habits. Same solder brand. Etc.

USE: Normal, hobby soldering: wire to wire; proto and veroboards, SOIC and some SSOP ic's to proto-boards.

I guess I'm a bit disappointed with the FX-888D. Compared to, say my old Weller 35-watt (using similar style tips), the whole workflow seems to be ... well, not as smooth. Solder takes longer to melt, and flow to spot I need. More bridging and blobs. Not sure why? Maybe I need to use another temp with the FX-888D. Anyone know what the usual tip temps are for tradit. 25- and 35-w irons?

About tips ... I've just replaced the OEM Hakko FX tips with a third-party "Solder Fun" tip. The OEM may have begun to wear out its plating, despite being well below life-hours use, and good tip cleaning habits. Not sure ... may be too much power cycling (I won't leave the FX on if I'm not using it within a 20 min. time window).

[BillyO]

but I'm still on my orig. tip.

just replaced the OEM Hakko FX tips with a third-party

So which is it?

[13hm13]

but I'm still on my orig. tip.

just replaced the OEM Hakko FX tips with a third-party

So which is it?

Schweinhund! Hast du meine ursprüngliche Nachricht gelesen?

[wraper]

I guess you are not in Germany but in US, otherwise writing Farenheit temp would be strange. IMHO you are comparing different tips. Like chisel on unregulated iron with small conical tip on 888D. Or your 888D is fake of which there are plenty and came with garbage heater and tip. It's extremely unlikely that 888D would perform worse than unregulated iron while using same type of tips.

[donlisms]

Never buy cheap tips.  Tips are The Thing.  Everything else in the iron is just there to drive the tip.  You are soldering with the tip, not the rest of it (unless you have a very strange technique!).

So... throw them away, and get a new tip from Hakko or someone who can be trusted to sell genuine Hakko rather than the many counterfeits available.  Hakko tips directly from Hakko's website are not very expensive.

Then...  I'm wondering if your technique over the years is based on irons that are too hot, and you're just used to it.  750F is too hot for most normal soldering.  I might suggest 650F or so, except on special occasions where the components are more massive.  If it's taking legitimately too long to heat up the parts, and all other issues have been properly addressed, turn up the heat a little, temporarily.  Nothing in your list of typical connections strikes me as being very massive, so in general, ... no.

I wonder about cleanliness; oxides and such can be horribly detrimental to good heat flow.  I wonder about the solder you're using; if it's, well... cheap... it could have bad flux or other contaminating ickiness that's just making a mess of everything.

I don't know which tips you're using, but the mass between the heating element and the workpiece, i.e. the mass of the tip, makes a pretty huge difference in the heat transfer.  It could be you're not using the right one.  I like chisels, and I choose them to fit the size of the connections I'm working on.  For "normal" stuff, probably a D16 or D24.

Good temperature control, good tip, good solder, good flux, good technique, and you should be soldering up shiny trinkets like a ninja!  I really don't guess it's the Hakko; several other factors have changed, no?  Take one issue at a time and make sure you've got it covered, then move on.

[BillyO]

Schweinhund! Hast du meine ursprüngliche Nachricht gelesen?

I did, and don't call me a schweinhund, Schweinhund.

You had both of those in your OP.  They are actual quotes.  Either you are still on your original tip (as you state in your 2nd sentence), or you have replaced it (as you state in your 3rd last sentence).  It can't be both.

[BillyO]

I guess you are not in Germany but in US, otherwise writing Farenheit temp would be strange.

He does seem a little confused.

[thm_w]

Don't insult people here that are trying to help you, its poor form.

Your temperature is way too high for leaded solder (750F is 400C).
As Wraper said, what tip geometry? Maybe take a photo of the tip you are using with what you are trying to solder.

[13hm13]

I guess you are not in Germany but in US, otherwise writing Farenheit [SIC!!!] temp would be strange. IMHO you are comparing different tips. Like chisel on unregulated iron with small conical tip on 888D. Or your 888D is fake of which there are plenty and came with garbage heater and tip. It's extremely unlikely that 888D would perform worse than unregulated iron while using same type of tips.

  Du bist sicher ein Schweinhund, weil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Gabriel_Fahrenheit aus Deutschland kommt. Verstehst du, Schweinehund?
Anyway ...
Got mine from 888D from Amazon. Could be fake -- since most of Amazon reviews are fake. Switching to the SolderFun tip -- also purch'd concurrently with 888D, and just installed a few hrs ago -- did not improve things. The 888d RTD is accurate, I assume. I'll have to get my IR meter out.

[13hm13]

Your temperature is way too high for leaded solder (750F is 400C).
As Wraper said, what tip geometry? Maybe take a photo of the tip you are using with what you are trying to solder.

  (750F is 400C) is what the 888D runs at default. With the OEM tip. I assume Hakko programmed the firmware with the optimal (default) temp for their supplied tip.
Hakko T18D16P Tip for Fx-888 Station, 1.6mm. Anyway, this over-temp might have damaged the tip. Even with low hours and careful, gentle use and cleaning.

[jonpaul]

tip temps inaccurate with IT temp meter, use small GA type K thermocouple, lots,of,63/37 solder, place thermocouple on hot tip, wait for stable reading

The IR probes do not have the resolution and the view area much too wide.

The iron tips are calibrated with a TC.

agree 750 F is way high.

We use Metcal SmartHeat SP-200 and old analog Hakko 926, 936 with genuine Metcal and Hakko tips, never had any issues in decades.

Our  solder stock is Kester 44 core 63/37 Eutectic the or 60/40.

Amicalement

Jon

[thm_w]

(750F is 400C) is what the 888D runs at default. With the OEM tip. I assume Hakko programmed the firmware with the optimal (default) temp for their supplied tip.
Hakko T18D16P Tip for Fx-888 Station, 1.6mm. Anyway, this over-temp might have damaged the tip. Even with low hours and careful, gentle use and cleaning.

Optimal temperature is not about the tip type, its about the solder and what you are soldering. In this case leaded solder, which melts at lower temperature than lead-free.
A 1.6mm tip is on the small end of things, it won't be great at getting heat into thick copper or through hole parts, although it should be fine for average SMD parts and protoboards you are talking about.

If you are used to using the Weller 35W (WP35) it looks like that operates at an even higher temperature, 450C!

How is the fit of the official Hakko tip on the heater core? if its very loose the heat wont transfer well.
Sounds like some people also bad-calibrate the unit and resetting it helped:

[bdunham7]

I have the older FX-888 and I run it at 365C/690F for typical leaded solder and it works fairly well.  Your default temp might be more suitable for unleaded solder.  I would suggest you use only Hakko tips and I especially recommend the bevelled ones over the chisel type.  Kimco has free shipping on tips, don't buy from questionable sellers. 

https://gokimco.com/collections/hakko-t18-soldering-tips/products/hakko-t18-c2-beveled-solder-tip-2-00mm

[13hm13]

I have the older FX-888 and I run it at 365C/690F for typical leaded solder and it works fairly well.  Your default temp might be more suitable for unleaded solder.  I would suggest you use only Hakko tips and I especially recommend the bevelled ones over the chisel type.  Kimco has free shipping on tips, don't buy from questionable sellers. 

https://gokimco.com/collections/hakko-t18-soldering-tips/products/hakko-t18-c2-beveled-solder-tip-2-00mm

Yeah ... Hakko might have set for Pb-free. And didn't say much about it .... I hate sloppy ... Schnweine

https://youtu.be/Q8LDp1hgWVY?t=97

[13hm13]

How is the fit of the official Hakko tip on the heater core? if its very loose the heat wont transfer well.

Tight and clean AFAICT. Ditto clean with the metal sleeve.
I do think that the OEM 888D tip is is not the same geometry as my Weller. The bevel tip bdunham7 noted might be more like it.

Not sure what would work best if my normal projects are, e.g., like this:




Had a helluva time just soldering that simplicity up with the Hakko 888D at 750F. A lot of blobbing and bridges. Messy, sloppy!
 Don't recall the old 35-W Weller having issues with similar projects.

[bdunham7]

Not sure what would work best if my normal projects are, e.g., like this:



Had a helluva time just soldering that simplicity up with the Hakko 888D at 750F. A lot of blobbing and bridges. Messy, sloppy!

Depends on how you are doing it.  If you are drag-soldering, then look at the S6/S7 bevel tips.  If you are doing one lead at a time with a magnifier, they have CF-series bevel tips that are tinned only on the face so that the solder doesn't turn the whole tip into a blob. 

[BillyO]

I 2nd the idea to use Hakko tips.  I very fortunately found a deal on a large quantity of them back in 2012 and will probably ( ) never need to buy more.

For .157 lead spacing I use a fine point tip.  I never got the hang of dragging.  I usually end up with a lot of bridges to clear even though I do use good solder.  Kester 60/40 is my goto but I also have a small supply of MG Chemicals (which is just as good IMHO).

I generally run between 350C to 375C depending on the age of the PCB I'm working on but I never use lead free solder so can't offer advice there.

[nigelwright7557]

I use a £15 Antex ER30 and had it for many years, tips last a very long time.
It does take a couple of minutes to warm up but I can do other things while I wait.
I build hundreds of pcb's every year so it gets a lot of use.

[vk6zgo]

My Weller WTCP uses 700F (371C) tips for normal leaded solder.

Over time, it has become increasingly difficult to obtain these, with suppliers fobbing me off with 800F (427C), which are good for unleaded solder, but require a fairly high degree of finesse & care to use successfully with leaded.

I dip my hat to you for being able to achieve good results with the WP35, as it is many years since I have used a non-temp controlled iron (although the WTCP is limited to whatever temp the tip is designed for).

My last job before retirement used an earlier version of the Hakko, which I found, could not maintain the set tip temperature when soldering to quite small THT boards, & in some cases, it was necessary to raise the board temp with a heat gun prior to soldering.

The FX-888D is a very different tool from those early models, so it surprises me that someone is experiencing similar problems.

[13hm13]

I don't think this is just my usual, overactive  imagination .... the overall build quality and reliability of some stuff has sunk despite huge advancements in technology. A modern Japanese car like Honda won't last 200k+ odometer miles like the one from 30 years ago. So, maybe the same with these messy, sloppy  irons.

The orig Hakko 888D tip and the new SolderFun tip, side by side:



The old-school girls, in dusty storage , but still very functional, and with plenty of new tips in the parts bin -- enough to  stave off the heat death of the Universe:

[iMo]

While looking at your soldering above it seems to me you do not use any soldering flux. In order to get a nice shiny joints you need a LOT of soldering flux (solder tip type regardless).

[Monkeh]

While looking at your soldering above it seems to me you do not use any soldering flux. In order to get a nice shiny joints you need a LOT of soldering flux (solder tip type regardless).

How many Rossmanns do you recommend per leg?

[wraper]

While looking at your soldering above it seems to me you do not use any soldering flux. In order to get a nice shiny joints you need a LOT of soldering flux (solder tip type regardless).

To get nice solder joints no additional flux is required besides what's in solder. It makes the job easier (soldering, but exactly opposite with cleaning) or may be needed to touch up the joint, drag soldering, or if solderable surfaces are not that good. But when soldering terminals one by one generally it's not needed. So crappy soldering shows crappy skill rather than lack of flux as such.

While looking at your soldering above it seems to me you do not use any soldering flux. In order to get a nice shiny joints you need a LOT of soldering flux (solder tip type regardless).

How many Rossmanns do you recommend per leg?

Amount of flux he uses makes me cringe. However what he does generally requires some additional flux as it's either soldering by hot air, touching up QFN and similar.

[donlisms]

Flux manages the surface tension of the solder and surfaces.  It is very different in air versus in a bath of flux.  Within flux, the solder will want to form smoother shapes, will flow easier into itself and onto hot surfaces. In air, it will tend to splatter and smear and attach to the  nearby hit surfaces with random surface irregularities.  Experiment a bit and see if you can get more control of the flow of things. 

[13hm13]

No doubt more quality gel works! But that's a lot of fiddling and $$. Maybe if that's how you earn a living, then that's the way to go.
What Rossman does may be best for YouTube presentation -- nice, clean results that play well for the thumbs-up, like-n-subscribe audience.
I've never used anything other than a flux pen and the built-in flux inside solder.