Author Topic: Soldering iron recomendations?  (Read 21512 times)

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Offline Gyro

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Re: Soldering iron recomendations?
« Reply #50 on: March 04, 2018, 02:25:31 pm »
So my TS100 arrived.

Tip: Read the instructions there is a hint about the tip set screw.  I had mine taken apart wondering why the tip would not insert!  Doh!  All working now.

I love the speed it heats up with.  Love the fact it will display it temp as it cools down.  Haven't played with many of the settings except the temp so far.

However I think I need a tip with more mass to it.  The pointy tip is a bit tricky to get heat into things fast with.  I gather the tips aren't cheap.  I'm debating a rounded point conical or a wedge/chisel tip.

Haha, that is the downside of a firmly clamped tip, you do have to remember the clamping screw (don't loose the spare ones in the box)!

Tip prices aren't actually that bad, they're in the £8-9 range from ebay uk stock sellers, ok not as cheap as the 'buy a handful' fake T12 ones but at least you know what you're getting, I don't think anyone clones them. I'm not sure which tip yours came with but the TS-BC2 is a good general purpose chisel tip. That and the little pointed TS-I are all I've needed. I've wondered about one of the knife tips but I'm not sure whether they're tinned or just for plastic cutting.

With regard to firmware, MiniDSO provide firmware update downloads , so if you have a real warranty issue you can always put an original back on. I don't know if you've got one of the original (grey/black) TS100s or one of the newer brightly colored ones. The hardware in the newer on was thought to be identical but I've seen one report of there being a difference causing an issue with the Ralim firmware. I know that Ben is looking into it. It's the only report I've seen so far but worth keeping an eye on the issues list on github.

I've just noticed that there is a new V2.03-alpha release of the Ralim TS100 firmware. As hinted at above, there was an issue with the newer hardware - apparently they changed the accelerometer chip. The new release handles both versions. I've tried it on my older-hardware TS100 and it seems to work fine.

https://github.com/Ralim/ts100/releases
Best Regards, Chris
 
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