Homebrew PCBs

Hi all,

I have a board that I want to put a chip socket into.  But, and 
here's the problem, I want to solder the body of the socket, not the 
pins.

The body has a 40 mil dia, the pins are 18 mil and my board has 40 
mill holes.

When I try to solder near the socket, it melts the socket.  I guess 
if I had a flat tip I could squeeze it under (there is about 100 mill 
clearnace) and not touch the plastic.

An alternative would be to use solder paste as it melts at a lower 
temperature....


any suggestions ?  need pictures ?

Dave

What size (wattage) iron are you using and what kind of tip?

Jay Beckham
Berkeley Springs, WV
NEW WEB SITE: http://www.south-shore-line.com

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Dave Mucha 
To: Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com
Sent: 5/2/04 7:19:25 PM 
Subject: [Homebrew_PCBs] soldering technique


Hi all,

I have a board that I want to put a chip socket into.  But, and 
here's the problem, I want to solder the body of the socket, not the 
pins.

The body has a 40 mil dia, the pins are 18 mil and my board has 40 
mill holes.

When I try to solder near the socket, it melts the socket.  I guess 
if I had a flat tip I could squeeze it under (there is about 100 mill 
clearnace) and not touch the plastic.

An alternative would be to use solder paste as it melts at a lower 
temperature....


any suggestions ?  need pictures ?

Dave





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In a message dated 5/2/2004 10:24:20 PM Central Standard Time, 
jbeckham1@earthlink.net writes:
What size (wattage) iron are you using and what kind of tip?

For such as IC-pins and ¼W. resistors, a 15 Watt Ungar with iron-plated 1/8" 
chisel-tip is fine.  For such as where I want to solder a 6-32 or larger 
screw-head to one side of a PCB, I use a 25 W. Ungar with an iron-plated "stub" 
chisel tip.  A "diamond-point" tip is useful, too.  NO pure-copper tips, as they 
simply dissolve-away in molten solder very quickly!


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

On Sun, 02 May 2004 23:19:23 -0000, Dave Mucha <dave_mucha@...> 
wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I have a board that I want to put a chip socket into.  But, and
> here's the problem, I want to solder the body of the socket, not the
> pins.
>
> The body has a 40 mil dia, the pins are 18 mil and my board has 40
> mill holes.
>
> When I try to solder near the socket, it melts the socket.  I guess
> if I had a flat tip I could squeeze it under (there is about 100 mill
> clearnace) and not touch the plastic.
>
> An alternative would be to use solder paste as it melts at a lower
> temperature....
>
>
> any suggestions ?  need pictures ?
>
> Dave

You can buy "single socket pins" or you can simply break them out
of a old pc cpu socket (you get a huge number ;-) ).

Remove the plastic completely and then use them.
to hold them straight insert a (junk) ic.
(there are also fake ics out of sheetmetal but i don't see the advantage.
you can of course lower the pins into the holes (big drill) so that they 
are flush (or nearly)
with the surface. this is low profile and much better for HF i was told.
you can also buy suitable pins, without the narrow leg, that fit into big 
enough holes
directly.

ST

--- In Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com, Stefan Trethan 
<stefan_trethan@g...> wrote:
> On Sun, 02 May 2004 23:19:23 -0000, Dave Mucha <dave_mucha@y...> 
> wrote:
> 
> > Hi all,
> >
> > I have a board that I want to put a chip socket into.  But, and
> > here's the problem, I want to solder the body of the socket, not 
the
> > pins.
> >
> > The body has a 40 mil dia, the pins are 18 mil and my board has 40
> > mill holes.
> >
> > When I try to solder near the socket, it melts the socket.  I 
guess
> > if I had a flat tip I could squeeze it under (there is about 100 
mill
> > clearnace) and not touch the plastic.
> >
> > An alternative would be to use solder paste as it melts at a lower
> > temperature....
> >
> >
> > any suggestions ?  need pictures ?
> >
> > Dave
> 
> You can buy "single socket pins" or you can simply break them out
> of a old pc cpu socket (you get a huge number ;-) ).
> 
> Remove the plastic completely and then use them.
> to hold them straight insert a (junk) ic.
> (there are also fake ics out of sheetmetal but i don't see the 
advantage.
> you can of course lower the pins into the holes (big drill) so that 
they 
> are flush (or nearly)
> with the surface. this is low profile and much better for HF i was 
told.
> you can also buy suitable pins, without the narrow leg, that fit 
into big 
> enough holes
> directly.
> 
> ST


I have both styles and when doing 140 pins, or 6 strips, the strips 
are much easier.

The individual pins press into the board and look sharp, but pressing 
pins in takes a lot of time.  Also, I need some room above the board 
for clearnace for the crystal and chip.

Dave

--- In Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com, JanRwl@A... wrote:
> In a message dated 5/2/2004 10:24:20 PM Central Standard Time, 
> jbeckham1@e... writes:
> What size (wattage) iron are you using and what kind of tip?
> 
> For such as IC-pins and ¼W. resistors, a 15 Watt Ungar with iron-
plated 1/8" 
> chisel-tip is fine.  For such as where I want to solder a 6-32 or 
larger 
> screw-head to one side of a PCB, I use a 25 W. Ungar with an iron-
plated "stub" 
> chisel tip.  A "diamond-point" tip is useful, too.  NO pure-copper 
tips, as they 
> simply dissolve-away in molten solder very quickly!
> 
> 

The irons I am using are 30 watt cone point, similar to the diamond 
point and a 100 watt.

Seems I should get a quality iron and quit with the toy stuff.

The Ungar stuff I looked at on the Web was 700 deg, interchangable 
tip stuff.

do you have any model numbers ? or series number ?

My wife's Weller is a Stained glass unit, I think it is a W100 model 
with self contorlled temperature tips.

Dave

> I have both styles and when doing 140 pins, or 6 strips, the strips
> are much easier.
>
> The individual pins press into the board and look sharp, but pressing
> pins in takes a lot of time.  Also, I need some room above the board
> for clearnace for the crystal and chip.
>
> Dave


well, you have obviously a problem there....

solder needs heat, plastic hates heat.

i see no workaround.

ST

>> The irons I am using are 30 watt cone point, similar to the diamond
>> point and a 100 watt.
>>
>> Seems I should get a quality iron and quit with the toy stuff.
>>
>> The Ungar stuff I looked at on the Web was 700 deg, interchangable
>> tip stuff.
>
> The screw-in element and screw-on (stud on the element!) stuff sold at 
> Radio
> Shack is Ungar,  I have 25W, 33W, and 45W elements and an assortment of 
> tips
> I use here.


I don't really see why one would want different wattage heaters?
I mean if the iron isn't too cumbersome for a really small tip why not 
just reduce
the temperature?

ST

On Monday 03 May 2004 11:49 am, Dave Mucha wrote:

> > screw-head to one side of a PCB, I use a 25 W. Ungar with an iron-
> > plated "stub" chisel tip.  A "diamond-point" tip is useful, too.  NO
> > pure-copper tips, as they simply dissolve-away in molten solder very
> > quickly!

> The irons I am using are 30 watt cone point, similar to the diamond
> point and a 100 watt.
>
> Seems I should get a quality iron and quit with the toy stuff.
>
> The Ungar stuff I looked at on the Web was 700 deg, interchangable
> tip stuff.

The screw-in element and screw-on (stud on the element!) stuff sold at Radio 
Shack is Ungar,  I have 25W, 33W, and 45W elements and an assortment of tips 
I use here.

I've also built a little box with a couple of toggle switches and neon 
indicators which I use for both an on-off switch and to put a diode in series 
with it,  giving half-power for any of them,  comes in real handy for 
"standby"...

On Monday 03 May 2004 01:03 pm, Stefan Trethan wrote:

> I don't really see why one would want different wattage heaters?

It all depends on what you're working on.  I've been working on this stuff for 
a *LONG* time,  back when a metal chassis was the norm and vacuum tubes were 
the active elements.  For some of that stuff I also might drag out my old 
Weller soldering *gun*,  which is rated at 100/140W.	:-)

> I mean if the iron isn't too cumbersome for a really small tip why not
> just reduce the temperature?

And how would you suggest doing that?  I'm not talking about a "soldering 
station" here,  which were still fairly pricey when I was buying this stuff. 
I'm talking about the *cheap* stuff.  And a reduction in temperature was 
accomplished by placing a diode in series with the iron,  running it at half 
power...

> And how would you suggest doing that?  I'm not talking about a "soldering
> station" here,  which were still fairly pricey when I was buying this 
> stuff.
> I'm talking about the *cheap* stuff.  And a reduction in temperature was
> accomplished by placing a diode in series with the iron,  running it at 
> half
> power...
>
>

I see... well stations are not much more expensive (maybe 2x to 3x)
and they are worth the money.

You can easily build your own i reckon, it's just a triac and a few other
parts after all.
Supply it with rectified (and cap. filtered) AC and you get the necessary 
"plus"
in power for enabling the control loop to work - so you can still use
your 110VAC heater.

Would be a nice project, only a few hours...

ST

On Monday 03 May 2004 01:23 pm, Stefan Trethan wrote:
> > And how would you suggest doing that?  I'm not talking about a "soldering
> > station" here,  which were still fairly pricey when I was buying this
> > stuff.
> > I'm talking about the *cheap* stuff.  And a reduction in temperature was
> > accomplished by placing a diode in series with the iron,  running it at
> > half power...

> I see... well stations are not much more expensive (maybe 2x to 3x)
> and they are worth the money.

Not these days.  They used to be quite a bit more expensive than they are now.

> You can easily build your own i reckon, it's just a triac and a few other
> parts after all.

Not the ones I'm thinking of -- what you describe sounds pretty much like a 
light dimmer would be,  and I don't see any reason not to use one of those 
rather than going to the trouble of building one,  if you wanted to go that 
way.  But what I was thinking of were the ones that had temperature 
regulation built into them,  where a thermal load on the tip of the iron 
would crank up the heating element a bit,  to maintain proper temperature, 
according to where you had it set.

> Supply it with rectified (and cap. filtered) AC and you get the necessary
> "plus" in power for enabling the control loop to work - so you can still use
> your 110VAC heater.

Control loop?  Where's the feedback portion of it?

>> Supply it with rectified (and cap. filtered) AC and you get the 
>> necessary
>> "plus" in power for enabling the control loop to work - so you can 
>> still use
>> your 110VAC heater.
>
> Control loop?  Where's the feedback portion of it?
>

either the heater itself or a external small thermistor/thermocouple..

ST

On Monday 03 May 2004 03:50 pm, Stefan Trethan wrote:
> >> Supply it with rectified (and cap. filtered) AC and you get the
> >> necessary "plus" in power for enabling the control loop to work - so you
> >> can still use your 110VAC heater.

> > Control loop?  Where's the feedback portion of it?

> either the heater itself or a external small thermistor/thermocouple..

Ah,  there's the catch.  That sort of thing would mean modifying the iron 
itself,  or worse yet the element,  and I *really* don't want to go there.  
At some point,  perhaps I'll stumble across a really good deal on one of 
those "soldering stations",  or perhaps not.  I had a period of several 
*years* go by here without me having fired an iron up at all,  so it's 
probably not worth my while to make any serious investment in such a thing.

No, the resistance of the heater changes with temperature.
You need not modify it.
It is done this way in my station, only 2 wires.

ST

>
> Ah,  there's the catch.  That sort of thing would mean modifying the iron
> itself,  or worse yet the element,  and I *really* don't want to go 
> there.
> At some point,  perhaps I'll stumble across a really good deal on one of
> those "soldering stations",  or perhaps not.  I had a period of several
> *years* go by here without me having fired an iron up at all,  so it's
> probably not worth my while to make any serious investment in such a 
> thing.
>
>
>
>
> Be sure to visit the group home and check for new Bookmarks and files:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Homebrew_PCBs
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>

An interesting variation is to add a temperature switch near, or in  
contact with the iron's tip, when it's in the holder.
When the temp rises, the switch opens, thus creating a "standby" effect  
also. When out of the holder, the iron
heats to full temp. The switches can be bought at RadioShack, and are  
used in coffee pots, hair dryers, etc.

Regards,
   JJ

On Monday, May 3, 2004, at 01:05 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote:

> On Monday 03 May 2004 11:49 am, Dave Mucha wrote:
>
>>> screw-head to one side of a PCB, I use a 25 W. Ungar with an iron-
>>> plated "stub" chisel tip.  A "diamond-point" tip is useful, too.  NO
>>> pure-copper tips, as they simply dissolve-away in molten solder very
>>> quickly!
>
>> The irons I am using are 30 watt cone point, similar to the diamond
>> point and a 100 watt.
>>
>> Seems I should get a quality iron and quit with the toy stuff.
>>
>> The Ungar stuff I looked at on the Web was 700 deg, interchangable
>> tip stuff.
>
> The screw-in element and screw-on (stud on the element!) stuff sold at  
> Radio
> Shack is Ungar,  I have 25W, 33W, and 45W elements and an assortment  
> of tips
> I use here.
>
> I've also built a little box with a couple of toggle switches and neon
> indicators which I use for both an on-off switch and to put a diode in  
> series
> with it,  giving half-power for any of them,  comes in real handy for
> "standby"...
>
>
>
>
>
>
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>
>

what temerature does it open at?  what's the part number of this 
switch?  

--- In Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com, John Johnson <johnatl@m...> 
wrote:
> An interesting variation is to add a temperature switch near, or 
in  
> contact with the iron's tip, when it's in the holder.
> When the temp rises, the switch opens, thus creating a "standby" 
effect  
> also. When out of the holder, the iron
> heats to full temp. The switches can be bought at RadioShack, and 
are  
> used in coffee pots, hair dryers, etc.
> 
> Regards,
>    JJ
> 
> On Monday, May 3, 2004, at 01:05 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
> 
> > On Monday 03 May 2004 11:49 am, Dave Mucha wrote:
> >
> >>> screw-head to one side of a PCB, I use a 25 W. Ungar with an 
iron-
> >>> plated "stub" chisel tip.  A "diamond-point" tip is useful, 
too.  NO
> >>> pure-copper tips, as they simply dissolve-away in molten solder 
very
> >>> quickly!
> >
> >> The irons I am using are 30 watt cone point, similar to the 
diamond
> >> point and a 100 watt.
> >>
> >> Seems I should get a quality iron and quit with the toy stuff.
> >>
> >> The Ungar stuff I looked at on the Web was 700 deg, 
interchangable
> >> tip stuff.
> >
> > The screw-in element and screw-on (stud on the element!) stuff 
sold at  
> > Radio
> > Shack is Ungar,  I have 25W, 33W, and 45W elements and an 
assortment  
> > of tips
> > I use here.
> >
> > I've also built a little box with a couple of toggle switches and 
neon
> > indicators which I use for both an on-off switch and to put a 
diode in  
> > series
> > with it,  giving half-power for any of them,  comes in real handy 
for
> > "standby"...
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor  
> > ---------------------~-->
> > Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or 
Lexmark
> > Printer at MyInks.com.  Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US 
&  
> > Canada.
> > http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511
> > http://us.click.yahoo.com/mOAaAA/3exGAA/qnsNAA/bGYolB/TM
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------
--- 
> > ~->
> >
> > Be sure to visit the group home and check for new Bookmarks and 
files:

> > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Homebrew_PCBs
> > Yahoo! Groups Links
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >

Please trim your replies.

Most overtemp switches like that trigger at 135 to 150 Celsius.
Personally I would not want to have to take the iron out and then wait
for it to come up to operating temp.

Good used Weller irons with temp controlled tips can be bought at very
reasonable prices. Or do like I did, shop around- I bought just the
handle/cable assembly brand new for about $50 or $60. I put it in a
good ceramic iron holder I already had, and used a surplus 24V AC
transformer to power it. Get one rated at 2.5 to 3A.

Steve

--- In Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com, "Phil" <phil1960us@y...> wrote:

> what temerature does it open at?  what's the part number of this 
> switch?  
> 
> --- In Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com, John Johnson <johnatl@m...> 
> wrote:
> > An interesting variation is to add a temperature switch near, or 
> in  
> > contact with the iron's tip, when it's in the holder.
> > When the temp rises, the switch opens, thus creating a "standby" 
> effect  
> > also. When out of the holder, the iron
> > heats to full temp. The switches can be bought at RadioShack, and 
> are  
> > used in coffee pots, hair dryers, etc.
> > 
> > Regards,
> >    JJ