Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[Cerebus]

Well, not exactly a no-no... just restricted to use in places where cad-plating's "special set of skills" are paramount; natural lubricity, resistance to gall-welding, corrosion-resistance, and especially galvanic compatibility as an intermediary between aluminum and ferrous hardware, in which case there is pretty much no substitute.

But yeah, we no longer use cad-plate interchangeably with zinc coatings like we used to.

I did say "somewhat of a no-no". I remember when you could spot stuff made for the military by the presence of cadmium plating on everything that wasn't hexavalent chromium passivated. If you believe some people, by current standards the stuff could kill you just by standing next to it, no need for the military to actually use anything properly deadly. I tend to take a fairly robust attitude towards all those traces of things that are supposed to kill me - I do draw the line at keeping cyanide in the kitchen though, unless it's already wrapped up in almonds or cherry brandy.

[Neomys Sapiens]

You wouldn't want me to repair my equipment with this disgusting new sissy tree-huggish kid-safe useless stuff, do you? I just need 3 of them, so someone come forward with the original lickable sweet cadmium plated goodness!

[Specmaster]

Good news chaps, the FX951 Soldering Iron stand can be easily modified to make what is imo the best Iron stand for the FX9501 handle - I just installed the wire backwards, bent it down a bit and bent the frame upwards a bit and voila! 

 

Yeah, the whole point of these iron holders is that the hole fits the collar of the iron literally like a glove; that way the weight of the iron (or the force of your hand) is supported entirely by the handle, not the heater cartridge.

Also, when you pull it out, instead of pulling the entire length of the iron "out of the hole", you only have to pull it out a few mm and then you can just lift straight up. It is a much more natural motion, and one that greatly reduces fatigue in a production setting where repetition is the word of the day. This is one of the many things people love about their MetCal stations, and why Hakko copied the design.

Of course neither of these manufacturers planned on how these clone handles of a discontinued design and clone iron holders and even the whole stations have proliferated in the wild, where the product is a copy of a copy of a copy and any pretense at QC is at best a mental exercise rather than actual practice. And I'm sure neither of them mind that the copies don't fit or work right like the original does; not even a tiny little bit.

mnem
*Checks his tracking*

Mmm, while I like the look of the FX951 holder I have to confess that I'm not at convinced of the longevity of it in the fashion that djos has modded it. If you can remember back to the photos that bd139 posted on his FX951, he also had the retaining wire mounted backwards which IMHO actually is putting more stress on the cartridge as the retaining wire is some distance away from the handle itself thus exerting greater leverage on the cartridge and the the terminations within. Whereas if you look at my mod, the retaining wire (or in my case, retaining bolt is right at the end of the handle, just where the cartridge exits the handle so exerting less pressure. Granted I do have to withdraw the entire length of the cartridge in order to use it but I don't see that as a major problem at all. The Weller and many other irons use the conical spring approach which means that the iron has to withdrawn by about 180mm before the tip clears the spring cone but I only have to pull it backwards by 40mm before I can start to use the iron. It also means that the retaining point is further away from the heated section so will wick away less heat while in the holder. I also find that action of engaging and disengaging from the holder to be perfectly natural.

[djos]

Good news chaps, the FX951 Soldering Iron stand can be easily modified to make what is imo the best Iron stand for the FX9501 handle - I just installed the wire backwards, bent it down a bit and bent the frame upwards a bit and voila! 

 

Yeah, the whole point of these iron holders is that the hole fits the collar of the iron literally like a glove; that way the weight of the iron (or the force of your hand) is supported entirely by the handle, not the heater cartridge.

Also, when you pull it out, instead of pulling the entire length of the iron "out of the hole", you only have to pull it out a few mm and then you can just lift straight up. It is a much more natural motion, and one that greatly reduces fatigue in a production setting where repetition is the word of the day. This is one of the many things people love about their MetCal stations, and why Hakko copied the design.

Of course neither of these manufacturers planned on how these clone handles of a discontinued design and clone iron holders and even the whole stations have proliferated in the wild, where the product is a copy of a copy of a copy and any pretense at QC is at best a mental exercise rather than actual practice. And I'm sure neither of them mind that the copies don't fit or work right like the original does; not even a tiny little bit.

mnem
*Checks his tracking*

Mmm, while I like the look of the FX951 holder I have to confess that I'm not at convinced of the longevity of it in the fashion that djos has modded it. If you can remember back to the photos that bd139 posted on his FX951, he also had the retaining wire mounted backwards which IMHO actually is putting more stress on the cartridge as the retaining wire is some distance away from the handle itself thus exerting greater leverage on the cartridge and the the terminations within. Whereas if you look at my mod, the retaining wire (or in my case, retaining bolt is right at the end of the handle, just where the cartridge exits the handle so exerting less pressure. Granted I do have to withdraw the entire length of the cartridge in order to use it but I don't see that as a major problem at all. The Weller and many other irons use the conical spring approach which means that the iron has to withdrawn by about 180mm before the tip clears the spring cone but I only have to pull it backwards by 40mm before I can start to use the iron. It also means that the retaining point is further away from the heated section so will wick away less heat while in the holder. I also find that action of engaging and disengaging from the holder to be perfectly natural.

I'm not convinced there's much difference between ours, there's literally 1cm between the handle and the wire holding the cartridge so it's quite close to the handle and shouldn't cause any reliability issues. It' feels much better to use than the ash-tray style iron holder - plus the sponges are better (deeper and with the useful groves) and you can fit in a copper wire sponge cleaner too.

[frozenfrogz]

Modding soldering iron stands seems to be obligatory...
In order to get the Ersa i-Tool stand in cooperation with the solder fume tip-extraction I had to grind away from the ceramic part and turned a small aluminium insert.
My Ersa Power Tool almost fit into the sturdy Aoyue stand that came with my Int906C. Since that stand is built like a tank I just turned out the inside of the cast aluminium part. Would love to get something like this for the i-Tool!
Also: 3d printed attachment for the i-Tool to mount a solder fume extraction tube.

[bd139]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

[tautech]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

So 8g dead-bug links now ? 

[bd139]

Hahaha. SMD surprisingly.  Works nicely.

Come up with a new SMD prototyping and one off system that doesn’t require waiting for board turnaround which takes weeks at my budget.

Use a 1.6mm blank copper board as substrate and build small modules on 0.8mm board (etch resist drawn by hand - 15 min turnaround) and glue them on then jump them with kynar. You can cut the 0.8mm stuff with scissors.

Doing 0805’s with a 3.2mm bit TCP!

I’ve got several tens of kg of parts I’m never going to use so I’m looking at minimising space. SMD stuff takes up a hell of a lot less space in storage and when complete and is cheaper to start with.

[tautech]

Hahaha. SMD surprisingly.  Works nicely.


Doing 0805’s with a 3.2mm bit TCP!

Perfect tip size, I use it on 0805 all the time. 

0603 and smaller, well..... 

[Specmaster]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

You skipped the Quicko?   

I love both of mine, by far the best iron assembly I've ever come across.

[beanflying]

Speaking of rubbish. Soldered with my 968a 3mm bevel tip and 1206's because I needed the wattage not because I cant see 

All works great apart from the crappy big blue switch is allowing about 2V capacitivly across it when not pressed 

[bd139]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

You skipped the Quicko?   

I love both of mine, by far the best iron assembly I've ever come across.

Mainly because I still haven’t got a stand that is any good.

[Specmaster]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

You skipped the Quicko?   

I love both of mine, by far the best iron assembly I've ever come across.

Mainly because I still haven’t got a stand that is any good.

I guess it must be because over the years you become used to a particular stand and then it is difficult to move away from it? That said however, isn't it equally true of anything new, its hard to get to grips with a certain aspect of something after being used to a certain way of doing things?

I fully expect that when you started out with your Weller many years ago that there was something about it, interface, handle, tips, or the stand etc that used to annoy the shit out of you because it was well, just different to what you had before but then suddenly it seems to jell and over the years your memory erases the difficulty you had in the early days? For me I had also had problems with the ashtray style of holder that came with my 936 clone, which was the ashtray type but because I had thrown away the old spring cone type that I had with my old 240v direct heat iron, I had no choice but use it. Now I find it feels right to me and have fitted it into my bench such that it suits my style of working and now that I have 2 Quicko irons, I also now of course have 2 ashtray stands.

I'm currently in the process of replacing the original sponges as they were not very robust, that said however, I seldom use them as I prefer to clean my tip using the wire wool system.

[bd139]

The weller came after an Antex C15 which was shit so it was amazing

On the subject of soldering irons, found an Antex XS25 (without a tip) in the cupboard earlier when I was clearing stuff out that I didn’t even remember owning or buying. Think I bought it to change the element on my Aoyue 968.

[mnementh]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

The tips with the slug aren't for a regular iron; they're for the older TCPs with Magna-Stat. They work horribly with non-magnastat handles, and I think it ruins the magnastat action to use them in a thermo-electronically controlled iron. The number stamped in the slug tells you what heat they operate at. If you already know that, just ignore my prattling; others may find that knowledge useful someday.

 

Modding soldering iron stands seems to be obligatory...
In order to get the Ersa i-Tool stand in cooperation with the solder fume tip-extraction I had to grind away from the ceramic part and turned a small aluminium insert.

My Ersa Power Tool almost fit into the sturdy Aoyue stand that came with my Int906C. Since that stand is built like a tank I just turned out the inside of the cast aluminium part. Would love to get something like this for the i-Tool!
Also: 3d printed attachment for the i-Tool to mount a solder fume extraction tube.

Nice work modernizing the Ersa; what did you make the fume tube from?

A tip from experience; if you steal a diamond nail file from your SO, that and a little water will work really well at smoothing out the edges of your cut in that ceramic. Just takes a little patience. A trickle in the sink is best, but if you are careful, you can do it with a bowl of water on your desk or small table while you watch TV. I like to do that kind of tedious work while watching Star Trek & ST:TNG reruns; I find it therapeutic just like bd139 and his analog puttering.



I looked at your teardown on the INT906c; it appears they still use the same crappy aquarium air pump as my 2702. I like the soldering iron stand from yours better than mine, but I don't know how well it would fit my modded 9501/T12 handle. I may have to do similar modding to my Blue/Yellow Hakklone soldering iron stands to fit the cheap aftermarket 9501 handles; seeing your tidy machine work there may force me to put the Dremel away.

The 2702 originally used the obsolete T13 cartridges (not sure if they still do); so modding wasn't too overly complicated. Like you I found that I could recal it so that temps were close enough across the usable range that I didn't feel it was worth the hassle of reverse-engineering the hardware/firmware to get it right on.

I keep telling myself what I really need to do is just completely gut it and rebuild it with the KSGER T12 OLED controllers; make both halves completely independent. Maybe add a third controller for the desoldering gun; keep that ready to use.


Cheers,


mnem
*Tinker-putter-tinker*

[frozenfrogz]

Nice work modernizing the Ersa; what did you make the fume tube from?

Some 6 x 0.5 mm brass tube I had in stock. Wanted to order 5 x 0.3 ... 0.5 mm stainless but I would have had to order quite a bit since no one around here stocks that kind of (expensive!) precision tubing. Small diameter brass tube is easily available at the hardware store at little to no cost.

[mnementh]

Mmmhmmm... our hardware stores and HomeOwner Hell don't carry the K&S hobby metals anymore... I have to go to a Hobby Shop for that. The tubing they do have is all pretty thick walled; not appropriate. I used to have a collection of telescopic antennas I'd use as material for this sort of thing; the stainless steel ones actually bend pretty cleanly unlike the chromed brass ones. However, only a few remain, and none in stainless. I may have to go scour the flea markets for more dead radios & TVs to harvest them from.

I've edited that post while you were answering, BTW. See my comments on cleaning up the cut in that ceramic piece.


Cheers,

mnem
*Back to my cold little cave* (46 degrees F here in Houston this morning!) 

[frozenfrogz]

I've edited that post while you were answering, BTW. See my comments on cleaning up the cut in that ceramic piece.

I thought about cleaning it up or rather: Doing it right from the start. Although knowing better I opted for using the angle grinder and diamond blade instead of hand tools (or at least some water cooling). I was impatient and a little p*ssed at Ersa because they were non-cooperative with my i-Tool not working, but that is history.
Might give it a try some time

[bd139]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

The tips with the slug aren't for a regular iron; they're for the older TCPs with Magna-Stat. They work horribly with non-magnastat handles, and I think it ruins the magnastat action to use them in a thermo-electronically controlled iron. The number stamped in the slug tells you what heat they operate at. If you already know that, just ignore my prattling; others may find that knowledge useful someday.

Well aware of that

Mine is a magnastat. Weller changed the design recently so that the tips have two parts. You have the actual tip which is a small chunk of what it used to be and then the actual magnastat slug. I think this was supposedly so you could swap the 700/600 slugs out and use the same tips which means you don't have to buy larger combinations of tips.

This was really a massive cock up because it introduces a gap between the two things which kills some of the ability to transfer heat to the tip.

However the solution is that the old style tips work absolutely fine in the new irons.

Here's the new tip style which sucks (excuse EMRFD underneath - it's the only flat surface left in my corner )

[mnementh]

Going to sound lame here but I’ve skipped the quicko and have been using my weller this week. I found some old style tips without the slug and with a large flat bit hiding in the cupboard. Work much better than the newer style tips and now feels like a TCP from the 1980s

The tips with the slug aren't for a regular iron; they're for the older TCPs with Magna-Stat. They work horribly with non-magnastat handles, and I think it ruins the magnastat action to use them in a thermo-electronically controlled iron. The number stamped in the slug tells you what heat they operate at. If you already know that, just ignore my prattling; others may find that knowledge useful someday.

Well aware of that

Mine is a magnastat. Weller changed the design recently so that the tips have two parts. You have the actual tip which is a small chunk of what it used to be and then the actual magnastat slug. I think this was supposedly so you could swap the 700/600 slugs out and use the same tips which means you don't have to buy larger combinations of tips.

This was really a massive cock up because it introduces a gap between the two things which kills some of the ability to transfer heat to the tip.

However the solution is that the old style tips work absolutely fine in the new irons.

Here's the new tip style which sucks (excuse EMRFD underneath - it's the only flat surface left in my corner )

Well hell... I guess I learned something today. I've had Weller Magnastat-based irons on my bench (well now, on a shelf behind it) for 4 decades; this IS something I was unaware of in that vein. Of course, I haven't bought NEW Weller (aside from a replacement GT7 gun) in probably 20 years; I had a considerable hoard of spares collected around the turn of the millennium when everybody and his grandmomma was unloading them. That has dwindled to a couple heaters and a few tips and a couple questionable 'stats kept as emergency fallbacks.

Have they updated these newer models with the TRIAC/MOSFET mod we all did to prolong the life of the 'stat?

No comment on the math book... what you do behind closed doors is none of my business.


mnem
*Family Time*

[bd139]

Nothing fancy in the box. Just more plastic, an IEC socket and usual 1950s tech

[Specmaster]

Been watching a nice RF generator all the week and then at the crucial time, forgot about bidding on it while trying to find out some more information on a 1:5 scale F1 car that my son recently purchased as it is in need of some TLC. 

[bd139]

Those generators are rather nice too. If it went down to ~1Mhz I’d be on it like a seagull on chips.

Going to wait around for a Marconi 2955 test set I think. That has all sorts of nice RF test gear in one box.

[Specmaster]

I think the 2955 goes down to 1.5Mhz and is really designed for 2 way radio testing but I know that Radiocruncher uses one of those on domestic broadcast sets.

Still can't believe that I let that slip though my fingers like that, it went for £72 as well 

[Mr. Scram]

I nearly bought that Keithley 2100, but apparently that's one of the "fake" Keithleys. I guess I dodged that bullet.