Electronics project notes/Soldering notes

⚠ This is for beginners and very much by a beginner / hobbyist It's intended to get an intuitive overview for hobbyist needs. It may get you started, but to be able to do anything remotely clever, follow a proper course or read a good book. Some basics and reference: Volts, amps, energy, power · batteries · resistors · transistors · fuses · diodes · capacitors · inductors and transformers · ground Slightly less basic: amplifier notes · varistors · changing voltage · baluns · frequency generation · Transmission lines · skin effect And some more applied stuff: IO: Input and output pins · wired local IO · wired local-ish IO · ·  Various wireless · 802.11 (WiFi) · cell phone Sensors: General sensor notes, voltage and current sensing · Knobs and dials · Pressure sensing · Temperature sensing · humidity sensing · Light sensing · Movement sensing · Capacitive sensing · Touch screen notes Actuators: General actuator notes, circuit protection · Motors and servos · Solenoids Noise stuff: Stray signals and noise · sound-related noise names · electronic non-coupled noise names · electronic coupled noise · ground loop · strategies to avoid coupled noise · Sampling, reproduction, and transmission distortions Audio and video notes: See avnotes Platform specific Arduino and AVR notes · (Ethernet) Microcontroller and computer platforms ··· ESP series notes · STM32 series notes Less sorted: Ground · device voltage and impedance (+ audio-specific) · electricity and humans · Soldering · landline phones · pulse modulation · PLL · Multimeter notes · signal reflection · Project boxes · resource metering · Radio and SDR · vacuum tubes · Unsorted stuff · 'E-fuse' Some stuff I've messed with: Avrusb500v2 · GPS · Hilo GPRS · JY-MCU · DMX · Thermal printer · See also Category:Electronics.

This is largely about soldering in electronics, though some of it applies well to soldering in plumbing as well.

For a wider context, see Soldering, brazing, and welding

Soldering tools

Soldering irons - type and power

✎ This article/section is a stub — some half-sorted notes, not necessarily checked, not necessarily correct. Feel free to ignore, or tell me about it.

On flux

🛈 Note a lot of this is somewhat more anecdotal (coming from common wisdom, good or bad).
If you have better research - or better anecdote, even - I'd be glad to hear it.

Why flux - mechanics and chemistry

Desoldering

Wick / braid

✎ This article/section is a stub — some half-sorted notes, not necessarily checked, not necessarily correct. Feel free to ignore, or tell me about it.

Soldering braid

Wick, a.k.a. desoldering wick, a.k.a. desoldering braid, is useful to absorb the sorts of amount of solder left on a surface.

Used subtly enough, it can also clean up accidental solder bridges, and a few other tricks.

It's basically a braid of stranded copper, which gives it some room for the solder (a regular braided wire wouldn't work as well) and the idea is that when hot enough you get a capilarry-like effect.

Press the wick to solder, using your soldering iron on top.

Once this heats things enough, there's a capillary-like effect that makes most of the solder flows into the wick.

You should not need much pressure at all - enough for basic contact, the heat should do the rest.

You will probably have a much easier time with enough flux in the braid - thy physics are nontrivial, but the short story is that the braid will absorb/wick a lot better with it.

Dipping it in liquid flux just before use is perhaps the easiest - which isn't the form you necessarily have around.

Using braid also seems to work a little better when your soldering tip is flat, delivering heat faster. It also means that if you are holding the wick in place, you're less likely to burn your fingers.

If you pull open the wick it may absorb more, but only a little, and only if it was really packed before.

2mm-wide wick seems fairly general-purpose.

Wider can be nice for removing larger blobs.

See also

• Video: How and WHY to Solder Correctly
• http://www.circuitrework.com/guides/7-0.shtml
• http://www.morsex.com/building/atoz.htm
• http://www.kpsec.freeuk.com/solder.htm

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9FC9fAlfQE

On technique

Good solder joints

Read https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-guide-excellent-soldering/common-problems