[sdiy] surprisingly successful surface mount scenario

[Daniel Kruszyna]

john mahoney <jmahoney at gate.net> wrote:
> Would you tell us about your soldering tools and the solder and flux?

The solder is Kester 331 0.015" diameter. The flux pen is Kester #2331-zx.
They have a flux pen to match each type of solder core. My soldering iron
is a Weller WSD80 with an "LTK" tip: just my normal setup. I did spring
for a nice pair of tweezers (Wiha "7a") that were very useful.

As for technique, I mostly followed these two links:

http://bdmicro.com/smt/
http://dlharmon.com/solder/smd.html

Most parts I could first align and then carefully solder the corner pins
without disturbing the alignment. The 0603 parts actually need to be held
down. I found I could position those with the tweezers in my left hand
while soldering with my right. Add some solder to one of pads first and
then push the part into it to tack it down. Then solder the second pad.
Then touch up the first pad.

> > <http://krue.net/cansynth/lamp.jpg>
> 
> That's real DIY spirit! :-)

Well, I think I will eventually get one of those headband magnifiers as was
suggested, but I tend to do way too much research before buying anything.
And when those boards came in, I just had to get them going. :)

-- Daniel

PS - Someone asked about a generic dsp board a while ago. The author of the
     second link above also designed the DSPCARD, which may be worth a look.