Electronics > Beginners

Trying to solder with a cheapo hot air gun.

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sourcecharge:
So, I'm going for it.  I decided to do my first soldering using the hot air and solder paste method.

I was thinking of using type 5 solder paste ? with the flux already in it as I think a video was recommending it.

I don't want to buy a completely new air gun, but I have a harbor fright type low and high setting hot air gun.

I've used it before, and it can un-solder easy, but I wound up burning the board due to leaving it on one spot for too long.

Now, I just got brand new ucurrent boards fresh from the pcb maker, and ordered the parts.

(thank you sooo much Dave, I wish I could have simply bought them from you, unfortunately, none were available)

 I don't normally do air soldering at all so far because I use through hole components.

I would like to use this low/high solder gun to save money because I don't see a reason to actually buy a 150 dollar airgun to use 1 time.


The problem that I'm facing is that the air flow covers too much area which caused me to burn a cheap board last time, so I'm thinking that I need to get a nozzle to better direct the air flow.

The question is, are the nozzles that fit the rework stations the same diameter as those cheap air guns, and if not, is there a way to modify them, like an adapter, to allow them to be used?




Nusa:
I don't know that consumer heat guns have any sort of standard but it's way larger than rework stations as a rule. The nozzle adapter I'm using on mine reduces 23mm down to 8mm. Those are OD measurements on the adapter as I didn't remove it to measure.

My advice, unless you have plenty of parts to ruin, is don't do it with that tool. You're more likely to have success with the frying pan method. The paste solder setup for either is about the same. Practice on some junk board first. of course.

Hand-soldering is another good option unless your soldering iron is as crappy as your hot air tool. The original ucurrent has nothing smaller than SOT23 and 805 components. Pretty easy. The new version has some 603 stuff, but still not beyond hand soldering. You may need magnification, depending on your eyesight.

sourcecharge:
so, ok, what if I bought this one.  It's cheap at 50 bucks.

https://www.circuitspecialists.com/csi-hotgun-3.html

SMD Hot Air Gun with Digital Temperature Control

will that do the trick?

Nusa:
That would likely be good enough for what you want to do. Find something to practice on first. Removing parts from junk boards and then putting them back on, for example.

janoc:
I don't understand why are you messing with hot air and paste on the uCurrent boards. All those components are perfectly solderable by hand and it would likely be also faster and less messy than dealing with paste.

Keep the paste for boards with hundreds of parts or stuff that doesn't have accessible pins.

Hot air tools are primarily used for rework, not general soldering. They can be used to solder in a pinch but there are better tools/methods for that where you don't risk blowing the components all over the place, melting plastic and delaminating the PCB.

Your original Harbor Freight "gun" is literally meant for paint stripping. That should give you a hint that it probably is not an appropriate tool to use for electronic soldering. That's kinda like trying to solder with a propane torch. Possible but the results will match the tool used ...

If you want a hot air tool, you need to have one that has both the temperature and the air flow adjustable. It also needs swappable nozzles so that you don't "cook" half of the board when you are trying to (de)solder one resistor.

That Circuit Specialist one is a cheap junk, don't expert any miracles from that especially if you plan to desolder/rework larger components. But you don't need any of this for the uCurrent boards. Just use a normal iron and normal solder, add some flux and you will be fine.

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