I used to think I was awful at soldering, but turns out I had a really shit iron. I'm not great by any means, but I can get reliable results now.
Think I'm going to get a hotplate for doing surface mounted stuff next.
I don't think I have the best soldering iron. It's my dad's old one and not in the best condition. When I first tried soldering I had no idea what I was doing. I think I was soldering a 3.5mm jack to a Nokia cable. I was hearing up the solder and dropping it onto the cable which, unsurprisingly, didn't work too well.
You don't need to spend lots for something half decent. I use a maplin variable power unit with ceramic (?) bits. As long as you keep the bits well tinned and looked after you can get half decent results.
http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/50-w-solder-station-n78ar
Yeah, the pins are now at different heights!
If you've got some breadboard mount them in that first to clamp them in place. Probably all sorts of reasons you shouldn't do that, but it works for me!
That didn't work because I think the holes in the breadboard are deeper than length of the pins.
I might consider getting something like that actually. The one I have doesn't have a particularly small tip, wouldn't be any good for electronics.
A lot of the quadcopter stuff I was looking at needed soldering so I would probably need to do some at some point. I'll practise on something I don't mind breaking first though.
So how does that work? It just heats up the whole board and melts the solder? Can you stick it on your hob or in the oven?
Probably best finding something well reviewed online - seems that maplin one has some quality issues in the newer versions.
Yeah, noticed that it didn't have the best reviews. Some on Amazon with good reviews and solder suckers for slightly more. Just looked and the one I have is only 25W.
You can if your other half will let you. Need a nice flat bit of steel to put on the hob though to ensure even heating of your board (hobs normally have ridges)
I've not tried it myself, but looks interesting - you apply solder paste to the board and line up your components as best you can and then let heat and surface tension do the rest :-D
Sounds like fun. I don't think I could do it on my gas hob without a plate to sit it on :) I think I could have some fun with this stuff if I had any idea what I was doing. Really want an Arduino but no idea what I would do with it.
Get one and selection of components and follow some beginner tutorials. Once you get an idea of what sort of things you can do you'll start thinking of projects.
I think I will at some point. Would like yo have a play with one and see what it can do.
As we were talking about soldering irons this morning by brother in law text me to ask if I have a soldering iron. Made me giggle.
It's like Pixar! I wish it didn't make such a racket. Could you imagine the bitching you'd hear if you woke up to take a piss in the middle of the night? The whole house would be up because my dog would freak the fuck out and bark at it.
It is interesting, but all I see are the feds hacking in and watching your every move!
At least you'd know about it. I mean it'd certainly throw some light on the situation.