Electronics > Beginners

T12 solder station, 4 or 5 wire irons

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NickRNott:
Hello all.
I still use an Antex 25w iron I bought decades ago for a class I took. Now that I have some time I thought to upgrade and buy a 'new technology' DIY kit from Aliexpress. It's ridiculous how cheap some of these stations are and the most important bits are all in the T12 cartridge.

I'm quite excited to see that the modern irons have micro controllers and PIDs. It might be a nice way to learn about programming mcu's. Watching EEVBlog vids will do that to a person.  :)

I'm struggling to choose a kit that will still be compatible with open source firmware that I can tinker with. PTDreamer https://github.com/PTDreamer/stm32_soldering_iron_controller has written firmware for a KSGER OLED controller based on a STM32F103C8T but the KSGER boards have gone from version 1 to version 3 before he could properly finish. I have no idea if anybody will bother to adapt it for the new boards.

So now I'm stuck. Any advice?

Also I'm confused about the difference between the 5 wire and 4 wire irons. I know there are heater + & -, earth, and then thermistor/thermocouple and 'shake to wake' switch. But both handle types seem to have the same features.

exe:
Yeah, purchase decisions are difficult :). I used to be in the same situation with T12 stations. While I can't answer all your question, I can answer some of them.

1. Version 2.1 vs version 3. Rumors say KSGER's v2.1 stations run outsorced firmware for which the seller pays something. Version 3 is the same hardware, but with a completely rewritten firmware to avoid paying to the software developer. It's hard to find a good comparison, but people say firmwares are mostly identical, but 2.1S was more polished (as of a few months ago).

2. Is updatable firmware really needed? I have 2.1 station that "just works". I don't feel like I want to replace/upgrade firmware.

So, my advice: go for proven 2.1S with a shake sensor. The sensor works really great on my station, it's not like an encapsulated ball with spring contacts, it really detects motion (I'd say it's even too sensitive). I bought a complete kit in metal enclosure and I'm happy with it. It's really cool (or "hot"?), fast and compact. Beware it doesn't come with handpiece stand.

Just check tip ground connection when it arrives, I heard someone had issues with this and for some reason (bad SMPS?) the tip was at ~115V potential. So, worth checking.

Hergen Lehmann:

--- Quote from: NickRNott on June 17, 2018, 08:23:25 am ---Also I'm confused about the difference between the 5 wire and 4 wire irons. I know there are heater + & -, earth, and then thermistor/thermocouple and 'shake to wake' switch. But both handle types seem to have the same features.

--- End quote ---

5wire irons have an additional temperature sensor in the handle to allow for proper cold junction compensation. However, i'm unsure how well this is implemented in the firmware. At least the 3.0 firmware continues to show a menu item to manually enter a temperature, which does not make sense, if there is a sensor for that.

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