[sdiy] Opinion poll - Through Hole ~vs~ SMT

[ChristianH]

On Sat, 09 Jun 2012 11:37:33 +0930 Matthew Smith <matt at smiffytech.com> wrote:

> Quoth Altitude at 09/06/12 10:23...
> ...
> > Personally, I'd say 0805 is big enough to do by eye, 0603 is pushing it with
> > wire type solder.  I much prefer SMT parts, faster, cleaner, less work.
> 
> I've actually found 0603 to be slightly easier to handle than 0805, may 
> just be a good size match to my pointy tweezers. 

I haven't tried 0603 yet, but didn't find 1206 and 0805 to be
significantly different in terms of handling and soldering. I prefer
1206, but only because it's easier to put a trace between the pads, this
looks a bit dense with the 0805 package I'm using in EAGLE. But for
power decoupling caps, I happily use 0805 - you can easily place them
right where they belong, i.e. close to the IC.

> As regards wire, I 
> apply the solder to the iron, then to the component, rather than 
> bringing the three into conjunction as in "traditional" soldering.

I have good results by just tinning one pad, placing the part, soldering
this first pad (part's end is already tinned well enough out of the box),
and finally tinning and soldering the second pad. This makes positioning
the part quite easy, since there's only one pad involved, and after that
the part is fixed and can be soldered completely. Not much different
with 3-pin parts.

> I only use magnification for inspection after soldering, but good light 
> is essential.

Same here, I have a light table under the board, so solder bridges show
up nicely. This is particularly useful with 0.8 mm flat packs, I don't
solder those pin by pin. Each of the four sides is immersed competely
with solder, and then cleaned up by moving the soldering iron outwards
on each pin. Every now and then, a pin misbehaves, but mostly this works
well.

Maybe I'm just lucky with my eyes. Since I'm shortsighted, I just take
off my usual glasses and even though I'm 50+ now, extreme near range
works well that way. Other for inspection, I occasionally need a
magnifier for reading part labels. 

Chris