A friend was over the other day to recap his crossovers. I have a solder sucker but it really doesn't clean out all the old solder and we had a hard time removing all the solder. Then I remembered this little tool I use to clean out my gas welder tips.
I could pass these tiny round files through what little holes were left after we cleared out the solder.
Works really well and easy and they are inexpensive
I could pass these tiny round files through what little holes were left after we cleared out the solder.
Works really well and easy and they are inexpensive
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Solder vacuums, at least the spring-loaded cheapie little pump type I have, are good to get a bunch of solder off a board, but not very thorough. Solder wick does a great job, and leaves holes in traces nice and open. You go through a lot of wick.. need fresh wick for ever hole for it to work well.. but it does work well.
A bit of Chloroprene sleeve over the tip of a regular solder sucker is what I use. It used to be sold as size H30.
I shove as much as I can get onto the teflon tip and as it degrades pull it down a bit and trim the end.
It used to come in bags of 100 20mm lengths with an internal unstretched internal diameter of 3mm.
A bag lasts years and costs about the same as 3 or 4 teflon tips and almost eliminates wear of the teflon tip.
I shove as much as I can get onto the teflon tip and as it degrades pull it down a bit and trim the end.
It used to come in bags of 100 20mm lengths with an internal unstretched internal diameter of 3mm.
A bag lasts years and costs about the same as 3 or 4 teflon tips and almost eliminates wear of the teflon tip.
I've been removing tantalum caps from 45 year old boards using an Edsyn soldapullt but you
NEED a GOOD soldering iron. Some boards have a solid ground plane with no thermal relief. A
Metcal iron has no problem clearing the holes and no need to fool with files and picks. I cut
off the capacitor, flux the board, add a bit of solder and vacuum out the lead. Good tools are
worth it.
As Rayma said, do NOT use a file in the hole as you can damage the plated through hole. On a
2 layer board it's bad. On a 4 layer board it's destroyed.
G²
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FWIW: a plain sewing needle is 99% as good and may be a lot nearer than SS tooling. Yes, you can solder steel, but you have to work at it. Solder will not stick to cold steel, and you can poke a lead-hole quicker than a needle will heat-up.
I'll go with that idea. If you _have_ welder tools, you probably have more than enough metal-sense to not be filing the via out of its hole.
Hehe silicone nozzles arent all that new....
Way better than solder suckers with teflon tips however. I have a couple here that are half my age!
However, if you intentionally burn a notch into the teflon tip (yes caution, the fumes arent nice) then a teflon tip will seal better, than a perfect new teflon tip.
But I also cheat. Heat and tap the PCB on the table while the solder is molten.
But wear safety glasses!
I flicked solder into my eye at perhaps 12 years of age, when I was learning to solder. I blame my father, who just used to flick excess solder from the iron into a metal office bin
Stainless steel will cool solder too much or become hot itself, both complicate your task.
Old school is to insert a a wet (but not dripping) wooden toothpick in the hole.
Solder leaves a nice ring around a clean round hole, just waiting for the next component lead or bare wire.