Soldering Discussion: At what temperature do you solder switches?

I’m running lead free (Sn99 Ag 0.3 Cu0.7), and I usually run around 375°C.

3 Likes

Rebuilding my CA66 today and it seems I use 360°C so I was pretty close with my original guess!

1 Like

350° with unleaded Stannol Sn99,3Cu0,7 and about 280 for the good (leaded) stuff. The recommendation from Cherry should come from the ban on leaded solder in commercial use here in germany.

As for diameter, I use 1mm for Switches/MCUs (old leaded solder with specifications not longer visible) and also leaded Felder 0.5mm for SMD stuff. Expect diodes, I also use the 1mm there

2 Likes

Regarding your TS101, do you have it with a custom firmware?, or just the stock, most recent one?

I soldered my first board with a sub-$20 entry level Weller. It seemed to cycle between hot and less hot every minute. The result was not great. I had to redo a number of sockets. I then got a nice Hakko kit I could set at 650F and it was sooooo much easier to solder and de-solder.

2 Likes

Just the stock firmware.

I also use it with the barrel connector power cable, as I am right next to a good outlet. I found that it would take it little longer to get up/return to temp on USB C.

Really impressed with it though. If you are on the fence about picking one up, I’d put it in the “worth it” column. :+1::+1:

1 Like

Indeed!, already bought one a few days ago; thank you very much!

Odd, mine on USB-C gets up to temp just as quick as it did using the power cord it came with.

Using USB on any iron heavily depends on the power supply that you’re using. Regarding on voltage and poise output regarding the used voltage. The better the power supply, the better

1 Like