WB assembly tips?

[Diehl, Jeffrey]

Having done production soldering when I was younger, I have to agree
completely with these comments. 

I would, however, like to add a few things.

A small fan is also very nice to have.  Sticking your face close to a board
to solder on it is very hot and smokey work.  Remember that that smoke has
LEAD in it.  Use the fan to blow the smoke and heat away from you.

Also, if you do enough soldering, you WILL GET BURNED.  Usually this is just
a silly mistake with the tip of the pen.  Just keep some ointment on hand
and you won't have any or much discomfort.

Take frequent breaks.  Your tendancy will be to get close up to your work
and this will cause eye strain.  And this CAN do real damage to your eyes.

And as far as soldering technique...

Let the heat do the work.  Don't try to force the solder into the hole.
Just feed it as fast as it melts.

Heat the component lead and PCB pad for about 5-10 seconds before you feed
the solder and for about 5 seconds after you remove the solder.  You will
get better connections that way.  You should be able to see the solder
"fall" into the PCB hole if using plate-through holes or "settle" into a
nice shinny mount otherwise.

Your solder joints should be shinny when you remove the heat.  If they are
not, don't try to add more solder to fix it.  Remove the solder with a
sucker and do it again.  You probably need to clean your tip.

Do the resisters and capacitors first.  Get practiced on those components
before you start with the heat-sensitive parts likt transistors, diodes and
MPU's.

Hope this helps.

Mike Diehl.

-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce
To: diy_efi at diy-efi.org
Sent: 9/30/2000 5:21 PM
Subject: Re: WB assembly tips?


I'm by no means a EE, or soldering "Pro", and just have a few basics I
follow.

No soldering flux when working on PCBs, it can etch the surface of the
PCBs,
and can be a pain to neutralise.  I do use solder that has flux in it
thou.
The only brand of solder, and flux I use is Kester.  I'm a second
generation
user, and see no reason to change.  A cleaning well tinned soldering
iron is
a MUST.  A damp sponge makes an excellent tip cleaner.   It's the last
1/8-1/4" that must be clean and shiny (of the tip).   Using a swatch of
tape
will keep the component from moving when soldering.  A sharp set of
diagonial cutters are a must also.   Also, lots of light, perferably day
light, while this board isn't really easy to bridge connections, a
momentary
lapse in attention and you can.  A bridge is went you tie two traces
together that shouldn't be.  For working on this board .020" diameter
solder
worked well for me.
Bruce



> For a first time pcb solder-er  what are some assembly tips?
> I know some were already gone over (thank you Bruce-- i printed them
out
but
> don't have them on hand right now, so can't reffer specifically to
them)--
> but more specifically, what type of solder is suggested?  I have read
many
> different articles online having opposite prefferances-- some say to
only
> use solder with silver in it, some say to use the lowest melting point
> tin/lead solder you can find...(to help keep from melting down the
> components)
>
> or maybe i shouldn't have posed that question, as it may just be an
opinion
> thing.
>
> (once again-- because we can never thank enough)..Thanks to EVERYONE
> involved in the wb setup,etc,etc!
> I hope that the bs surrounding the WB, and the battle of everyone's
opinions
> won't make future projects dissapear (as i'm afraid they may already
have)
>
> PEACE!
>
> Camden
>
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at
http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp
>
>
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