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Hi everyone,
I've been wanting to do this teardown for several weeks now but other things have gotten in the way. I apologise to those I have kept waiting.
The SP-1010DR desoldering station is basically a ZD-915 with a different name on the front and a different colour. I am not aware of other differences but I have heard that there may be slightly different internals between these rebrands, so here are a bunch of photos with my comments and you can judge for yourself.
Note that I have tried it out a bit before taking it apart. Sorry Dave, I did turn it on.
Photo #1 shows the front of the unit. No surprises here. The layout is identical to the ZD-915.
Photo #2 shows the back of the unit. Nothing special here neither. Notice the ESD-sticker though. The 915 comes in an ESD and non-ESD version. This is the good one. The power connector has a 3.15A fast fuse.
Photo #3 shows a measurement from the tip to the earth pole of the power connector. Didn't bother to zero my leads though so subtract 0.2 ohm or so. Seems like a pretty good earth connection from the tip.
Next we go inside the unit with photo #4 and 5. I was surprised at two things here. First that everything was this tidy and well heat shrinked.
The second thing was that it has what looks like a switch mode power supply. I was expecting a transformer bolted to the bottom, possibly not even rectified before going to the heater element. Although it's most likely a terrible one. Also note the properly bolted and color coded earth wires.
Photo #6 and 7 shows closeups of the heatshrink on the motor and the power connector. Looks pretty well done.
Photo #8 shows the back. A 24V dc fan and a small box which must be the 5V buck converter. One end goes into the power supply and the other to the control board, so it can't be much else.
Photo #9 is the front. I didn't want to tear everything apart too much so please forgive me for only having this rather bad picture of the most interesting part. Note the earth wire going to the gun. Down on the right side is the main power button. The lower control board is for the other buttons and the upper one seems to be the logic and display. The soldering looks alright to me. You can see that one joint on the middle board is terrible. But the rest looks fine although with a little too much solder. If anyone desperately want closeups of the boards I could take it apart further.
One thing I don't like is how the wires to the gun have been squashed between the front cover and the metal bracket. Why is there a matching hole if not to be used? I think this is a assembly screw up. Might take it apart and fix that at some point.
It should also be noted at this point that the entire unit is in metal, except for the front which is plastic. As you can see most of the things are bolted to the front cover, except for the power button which is bolted to the metal bracket. Probably because it is live. Wouldn't want a 230V button in a flimsy plastic mount.
In general the unit feels very nice, everything is bolted properly. Except for the front cover, which is just terrible. It is bolted to the base and outer cover but it was very loose and no, just no. It feels cheap. Which indeed it is.
Moving on to the gun we have photo #10 through 12. Again, nicely heatshrinked and very good strain reliefs. Nothing much to complain about except for the wires to the heater which are sort of squashed and at odd angles. I'm afraid they might fray and cause a short. Or the core might just break. I'm also not a fan of the design for the glass tube. It is pretty hard to get in place and even harder removing. But it works.
Photo #13 shows the accessories supplied. All three available nozzle sizes and matching cleaners was a welcome inclusion. The nozzles are pretty dirty because I tried it out a few times and didn't care too much for the first two when messing around a bit. The middle one was mounted when I got a major clog which meant I had to disassemble the entire gun, at which point I figured that I might as well do this teardown. Rest assured that I will clean them properly in the future. Also included was no less than three sets of filters. The unit takes one ~20mm filter in the front and one ~16mm filter in the gun.
You can't see it but one thing I can't recall from Daves review of the 985 is a small metal plate which goes between the spring and the filter. It means the tension from the spring is more evenly distributed as well as taking the bulk of the removed solder. It's a nice addition which will spare the filters a lot I think.
The last photo, #14, shows the gun stand. It mounts to the side of the unit, although not for long. I could tell you what to do with it, but I fear that some would take offence at such brutality against innocent (generally speaking) Chinese engineers. Suffice it to say that it is complete and utter crap. Beyond description in fact. It. Does. Not. Work. I will be replacing it with one of these coil stands which can be had on ebay for a few bucks. I think it will work infinitely better.
My conclusion.
Having only used the device for a few minutes before I managed to clog it up so badly that it took me half an hour to clear it I'm really not in much of a position to review it. Basically you get what you pay for. Or as Alan Cooper (I believe) puts it, you don't get what you don't pay for. This unit is cheap, I paid in the area of $100-120 shipped with UPS and that included some 20-25% VAT.
The quality of the unit is fair. It does sound awful when it is cold and the plastic front cover looks and feels as cheap as the unit is. But in general the quality is fine. It could have been a lot worse for sure.
The unit, while it works, is a treat to use. It heats up rather slowly, like two minutes or so, but since it is desoldering I don't think I'll be in as much of a hurry as when soldering. So that is just fine. The gun is light, feels good in the hand and both the hose and the cable to the gun are very flexible. Suction is more than adequate and thermal capacity is alright. Large ground planes and really major soldering joints takes time but it works. I desoldered a joint on a very heavy (several kilos) transformer from a receiver and the leg itself was like 1mm in diameter and the solder around it was just vast. It took half a minute to heat up but after that it removed the solder perfectly and the board dropped away after all legs had been done.
So for the money, well worth it I'd say. Here in Europe I think this unit from TME might be one of the better deals since it is shipped with UPS, comes in black (let's face it, beige is f-ugly) and is the ESD version. I'm not sure if all 915's come with all three nozzles and three sets of filters. If not, then this one is probably worth a few extra bucks just for that reason.
Cheers
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Nice teardown.
That's the unit that Farnell / element14 sell as the Proskit SS-331, just in black. It is superior to most of the ZD-915 clones... Glass solder chamber, SMPS etc. I don't think anyone has found this one before, they're mostly the cheaper ones.
That black plastic box at the back just contains a couple of power resistors to drop the voltage for the vacuum pump motor. You can quieten it down (a lot) by fitting it with a cheap ebay 24V 3d printer fan in place of the existing one. Instructions here:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/beginners/decent-desoldering-ironstation/25/ -
Cool stuff man. I've had my ZD915 for a few years now and it's still going strong. I see they're using a 24V fan now - mine had a 12V fan, running off of the 18V supply, it was screaming and spilling its lube everywhere. Sadly, that seems to be the only improvement on the shitty construction choices. Here's the mods I did to make mine usable:
- cut out the fan grill since it was heavily restricting the airflow and causing a lot of wind noise
- removed the "shielding" from the SMPS. Why the hell is that crap there? The station already has a grounded metal case. All that this shielding does is restrict airflow and make the PSU die quicker.
- removed the resistors from the black box. No, it's not a DC converter - it's just two of 1 ohm resistors to drop the 18V from the PSU for the 12V motor. Now, this method is retarded, especially for electric motors. An electric motor draws most of its current when it's starting - this is exactly when the resistors are going to drop most of the voltage, making the startup wayyy slower than it could be. This is really stupid, because in a desoldering station, you want the vacuum to occur as quickly as possible, to get that "vacuum kick" to suck the solder out of the hole. I replaced the resistors with five 1N5406 diodes in series.
- the motor is switched directly by the microswitch inside the handle. Again, retarded, because you have the resistance from the wires (ridiculously thin "shanghai special" chinese wire, probably copper coated iron) and the contacts slowing down the motor, see above why this is a big problem. I stuck a relay next to the motor and wired the switch to switch the relay, which then in turn switches the motor (using decent gauge hookup wire). Also, I added a flyback diode to the motor to keep it from frying the relay contacts. It probably would have fried the microswitch contacts rather quickly - on the other hand, maybe they used that thin wire on purpose, you know, as a snubber, so they could save a diode ...
Also: don't bother buying filters. You can just cut a circle out of a cotton pad. Works just fine.
And be sure to check all the soldering connections _under_ the heatshrink tubing.
For reference: I paid around 70 european pesos and it came with 3 nozzles and I think 2 or 3 large filters and 4 or 5 small filters.
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Forgot to mention, I had the same problem with the glass tube. I ground mine down on a diamond hone. Something like this:
Shortened it by 1 or 2mm. It's much easier to mount/remove now. -
Wow, you really went for it didn't you!
I like your diode mod, I thought it was a different PCB for a minute.
... and there's me, still trying to work up the energy to saw out that hopelessly obstructive fan grill!
Thanks for sharing. -
Thanks. Saw? Nah, way too much effort. I just used a pair of dykes. That Chinese steel is soft as butter.
Just spotted another improvement: seems like they actually did add a flyback diode to the motor of Jon's station. Mine just came with two crummy caps for a little bit of spark/noise suppression:
But I see they kept the comically thin wire.
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The sign of a true craftsman!
I've a feeling mine has something heatshrinked on top of the motor, so probably the diode. I'm going to have to take the lid off again now - on Christmas Day too.
P.S. Just noticed his fan grill is different too, an array of holes rather than slots. -
What else are you gonna do on Christmas? Talk to your family?
My fan grill was just a bunch of holes as well:
My unit is almost 3 years old BTW.
Oh yeah, for the fan, I added a 10V zener in series, so it runs at 8V now, nice and quiet. -
I broke off talking to them just long enought to reply!
I like the way you've arrange the ring of spikes to protect unwary fingers from the rotating fan blades!... and it's reassuring that you now have two QC Passed stickers!
Didn't get the lid off mine though. -
Got one a few days ago and so far I'm very satisfied. Mine is the beige ZD-915ESD but otherwise exactly identical to the OP. After about 20 minutes or so of desoldering various components from scrap boards I took it apart to remove that stupid grill - warranty be damned. It was still a bit too noisy but removing it did change the noise for the better and the airflow is much better. I then used a few diodes to drop the 18V to the fan to about 12V and proceeded to use it for several hours without being annoyed by the noise. Still no clogging or any other issues and I don't mind it taking a bit long to heat up.
I was hoping that the gun stand could be mounted on the other side but unfortunately it can't because of the two screws holding the stand are interfering with the PSU. I contemplated drilling four new holes for the PSU to shift it more towards the center but decided not to bother right now. -
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I was hoping that the gun stand could be mounted on the other side but unfortunately it can't because of the two screws holding the stand are interfering with the PSU. I contemplated drilling four new holes for the PSU to shift it more towards the center but decided not to bother right now.
Damn, that was dumb of them. I always assumed that I could just turn the lid around if I wanted it on the other side. Filed for future reference.
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This looks like a fairly competent unit. Nice write up Jon!
Anybody know where the hell we could get one of these for stateside energy(115v, 60Hz)? -
I would assume that this particular model is made for the European market. But it should just be a rebrand of the ZD-915 and it is also made in 110-130V, art. 89-1511, so it should be available. The question is if there are any american rebrands.
Let the hunt begin. -
At least the version sold in Europe has a flyback-type SMPS that should work just as well with 110V without modification. Here's another teardown with pictures that has a closeup of the PSU:
http://www.experimental-engineering.co.uk/duratool-zd-915-vacuum-desoldering-station-teardown/ -
At least the version sold in Europe has a flyback-type SMPS that should work just as well with 110V without modification. Here's another teardown with pictures that has a closeup of the PSU:
That's interesting. I wonder what actually differs on the 110 vs 230V versions then. We know all the spare parts are exactly the same (kind of stupid not to) and it would be equally stupid to have a different board and vacuum pump I suppose. So we're basically down to the power supply and the mains fuse (which is user replaceable) and hardly even that since my unit is fused with 3.15A. That is 5x the rated power of the unit, what were they thinking there? Even at 110V it is 2,5x. I haven't really looked closely at mains fuses that often but is that kind of overkill usual when you don't have a high inrush current component? A bit extra doesn't hurt of course, but not more than 50% or so surely?
Maybe it's just the sticker that is different. :-) My unit specifically says 140W with 220-240V 50hz with a 3.15A fuse on the back. So I guess they would have to replace that when shipping it to the states.
Even if you get a version without the SMPS a 24V 5A power supply only costs like $15 on ebay so it can be upgraded I suppose. Might as well use a cheap psu for a cheap unit. It's not like it's going to be any less safe than it already is. :-)
Cheers -
Hi All
I have the ZD 915 desoldering station by Duratool but I'm having issues with the temperature rising above the set point. I would be grateful of any advice on how to indentiify and repair this problem!
Is this hardware or software?
Regards
Beau -
Grabbing a random thread on ZD-915.
I bought min from Poland about 6 months ago but then I never got around to using it until yesterday. Turns out the pump didn't work at all.
Given that shipping it back for a replacement would probably cost as much as a new unit and that I'm not afraid of a bit of tinkering, I opened up the unit today.
To my surprise, I found that the internals of the unit were in really bad shape. The ground connection on the pump motor had broken off and the positive side (coming thru the gun) was CUT! The small fan was also disconnected for some reason. How this unit got a passing QC stamp on the back of it is beyond me. The metallic case for the SMPS was also not properly put together but a little bending fixed that right up.
After making sure the motor and the gun trigger worked fine, I decided to take the opportunity to mod the unit, installing a MOSFET on the trigger instead of running 18V and a couple of amps thru the trigger. As it turns out, I was tearing some components off an old nVidia card a few days ago and had a HAT2165H N-Channel MOSFET left over from that which seemed to fit the bill for what I needed. After a bit of tinkering the unit is now back together and works just fine.
I'll probably revisit this unit's internals later as I think I want to rewire the whole thing eventually, but that will take me more time than I had this afternoon so that will be left to a later date.
However, anyone buying this unit - open it up and just check for obvious problems as soon as you get it. -
How does the nozzles last?
I see that internal parts are not plated at all.
Compared to QUICK 201B
Now compared to the SORNY ROONG INDUSTRIAL SL-928 that has visible stainless or whatever tube inside the above two are total crap IMHO. But the SL-928 cost 305.63 € that is 3.5x more then ZD915 clones. For some reason the replacement pump is sold at 140Eur. Now it's that good or that overpriced
And I cant find any reviews of SL-928
And then there is AOYUE 477++
http://www.aoyue.eu/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/265x265/eb14cea36dacc593d5a676650b3d0309/9/1/91417_1.jpg -
Just got this SP-1010DR unit and opened it up to check whats inside. Do you have better picture about the diode mod? Did you do something to bottom side of the pcb? Thanks!
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I think I drilled a couple of holes in the PCB to mount the diodes. But that was just because the diodes I had were salvaged and hard short leads. If you use new diodes, you can just solder them in. It's not complicated, just wire them so they're all connected in series.
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Waking this thread up as it has the "Diode Mod"
Has anyone used a DC buck converter instead of those two resistors, as they are extremely cheap now.
I have the ZD-8915 and was planning to change those two resistors to diodes like "mos6502" did but I have a few buck modules here so might try that.
I'll post some pictures in it's own thread soon, but decided to have a look inside the ZD-8915, it's laid out slightly different but still uses those resistors and that board is part of the front buttons now.
Looking underneath the first resistor there are 8 pads/holes for an IC or diodes? maybe they were going to go with some better voltage regulation, I can't quite see behind the 2nd resistor.
I will be adding a relay, I do not understand why they connect that motor directly to the microswitch, it's crazy I'm surprised it works at all looking at the gauge of the wire!
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SORNY ROONG INDUSTRIAL SL-928 desoldering station dead in usage after not more then ~48hrs run time.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/reviews/sorny-roong-industrial-sl-928-desoldering-station-temperature-sensor-failure/new/#new -
I used a 42mm hole cutter on the fan 'grill', utilising the centre hole as a guide (with everything out of the case) and cut it all out.
I cut a little from one side, then finished from the other to reduce any bur. A quick clean up with a half round file, some paint on the bare metal (I'm in the UK and we have some rain) and it's good to go.
New 'quiet' fan and a metal grill goes back in to finish this mod. -
Do anybody know specification or part of the specifications on the motor and vacuum pump? 12V? Watt? Lite per min? etc? There seem to be be some text on the picture with the motor but picture is too small to read it.
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Do anybody know specification or part of the specifications on the motor and vacuum pump? 12V? Watt? Lite per min? etc? There seem to be be some text on the picture with the motor but picture is too small to read it.
For anyone else wondering about this, I opened up my unit and the markings on the motor say
wwww.elt-motor.com
ELT-555-35046
20160513
Cheers