hakko vs. weller

[metebalci]

Hi,

Do you recommend hakko 936 or weller wes51 ? Hakko is a little cheaper than weller.

Thanks.

MB

[Magura]

Weller lasts forever, I dont know about Hakko.

Weller is also very pleasent to work with. If you plan to use it a lot....weller is the way to go. There are better irons out there, but they come at a much higher pricerange.

Magura

[Frank Berry]

Weller.
I've used nothing but Weller for many years. Replacement tips are inexpensive and they come in many styles.

[Magura]

Originally posted by Frank Berry
Weller.
Replacement tips are inexpensive and they come in many styles.

And most important...they are common almost everywhere in the world, so the availability is great. The electronics shop down the corner sure got them


Magura

[Centauri]

With all the support for Weller, better chip in....

I have been using Hakko 926 for 10 years - great iron. A place I used to work for got a 936 on my recommendation, and it is very good.

I think you would be happy with either of these.

Cheers

[jam]

I used a Weller for years and still have one, but I recently got to use a Hakko I think it has a slight edge on the Weller it seems to be better built and temp. seems more stable. The new Weller WESD51 also seems to be a good unit.

Most professionals swear by the Metcal.

But for my money this is it. The Hakko FM-202.

[jam]

They also make a cheaper version, the FP-101.

[rif]

I just pruchased a Hakko based on my own weller vs. hakko research. Haven't used it yet, but that's where I ended up. Hakko seems to have a following on bottlehead.com

[gmarsh]

My company uses Hakko gear almost exclusively. We do fairly high volume manufacturing, and the Hakko stations stand up wonderfully on the assembly line, and get the job done well with no reliably problems.

Taking full advantage of the 'corporate discount', I bought a Hakko 936 ESD iron for myself which I use for all my home experimentation... highly recommended.

I wouldn't call Hakko better or worse than Weller though, I've never had any problems with either. It's up to personal preference; I'm personally not that fond of the "coil spring" iron holder, and we've got a couple people working here who swear by their Weller stations and won't ever touch a Hakko. I guess it's like hockey teams...

[Fred Dieckmann]

"Most professionals swear by the Metcal."

At somewhere between a grand or or two I wonder why. They are great and I used one at work. I have seen them break before, but the engineers were pretty rough on them at work. The Metcal desoldering tips save my life since you can heat all the pins at once with the right tip for a particular IC package. You don't want to have to fix a pad on a large ASIC, trust me!

The Hakko stuff is much better built than the Wellers in the same price range and I think the performance is better I will never buy another Weller as the last two I had broke and were very flimsy designs. They looked like reliability was the last concern of the designers. Weller is riding on it's name and building stuff as cheap as they can make it IMO. Finding tips at my surplus store or Fry's for the Hakko is no problem.

Go with the Hakko......... this is a no brainer for anyone who has used both for a while.