Larry,
> ----
> I am intentionally over caution when soldering chips
> directly to the PCB. Maybe more than I need to be. I
> have never fail one soldering it in (well we won't mention
> that time I stupidly soldered them in backwards).
I've not known an IC that I've soldered to fail (but this is with 6 mo.
since my first kit assembly - not much time), but I'm still concerned
from the point of view that I may have damaged it slightly and it does not
immediately fail, but will in the future.
> But, I always solder the two corner pins and let the chip
> cool wheil I go to 2 corner pins as I insert the next chip until
> I have them ALL on the PCB. Then I go back and solder two
> more pins on each one, rotating through so each chip gets
> some "heat rest" as I make my rounds. I do this until I have all
> pins soldered.
>
This is nice to know since this is the approach that I have also taken
except that I solder one pin on each IC in the sequence of IC's. In my
semi-paranoid state I also make sure that the IC is not 'hot' before I
solder each one. Maybe overly cautious, but I suppose it is 'peace of
mind' I'm after. The best instruction in Paul's kit instructions is the
one that assembling is not a time race, but a matter of quality (or
something like that). May be I overdo it, but that phrase is always in
the back of my mind when I am assembling.
Interesting and useful topic today!
Jeff