Do you mind if I ask you where did you get it and how much did you pay for it? Does it have controllable temp. settings?
Voelkner and Conrad sell it in Germany:
http://www.voelkner.de/products/529596/OKI-by-Metcal-Loet-Entloetstation-analog-110-W-MFR-1350-10-bis-40-C.html
I bought mine from Voelkner via Amazon and for whatever reason, it was quite a bit cheaper this way back then.
Regarding temperature settings: like any other Metcal/OKi product, the desoldering gun of the MFR-1350 uses a "SmartHeat"
HF approach where the temperature is selected via the tip but actually, letting aside very special applications, you will
always use the default temperature tips. I was also skeptical at 1st but actually not having to care about a temperature
setting is a great relief. Indeed every time I needed to set the temperature on my previous soldering equipment, it was
only because it couldn't keep the set temperature when (de-)soldering stuff from/to the ground plane or other cases
where there was a large thermal capacity. With the SmartHeat stuff, you barely notice that something has high thermal
capacity. Stuff like de-/soldering full metal BNC connectors works like a charm without cranking up the temperature to
crazy values.
Thanks a lot for your input!
Indeed, Metcal looks pretty interesting.
We also have Conrad.pl here but it's a bit more expensive (about 4% more) compared to Conrad.de
So:
Metcal is 687EUR inc. VAT
Pace is 907EUR inc. VAT
Now comsumables:
Pace tips are around 27USD (5-pack) for a standard thermal mass and 60USD for high thermal mass
Pace also has tips to clean the pads that cost 36USD (5-pack)
Pace solder "one cycle life" container costs 14USD (10-pack)
Metcal offers
ONLY one tip for 34EUR (both for standard and high thermal mass)
Metcal solder container costs 14 EUR (10-pack)
I think that, when you are replacing in Pace a "one cycle life" container there is no need to replace the small filter within it, where with Metcal you have to add a fresh one.
0xdeadbeef you also have mentioned somewhere about a metal piece that gets smaller, wears out with time?
At first look, the Metcal seemed cheaper then Pace but the tips are way more expensive for Metcal. Replacing a full container seems also to be more expensive...