talking a little further about soldering.. the tip of a soldering iron, believe it or not, should be treated like a precision instrument. No, you cannot use it to melt plastic, or give it a quick file to get the tip sharper. The design of the tip of a soldering iron is a complex balance between different requirements. The first requirement is that the heat generated by the heating element needs to get to the tip as efficiently as possible. The magnetic sensor in the tip is used to control the temperature - it will demagnetize at the right temperature, and keep the heating element going so that the temperature at the sensor is right. Since the tip is where heat will be lost as you touch it to a cold piece of wire or solder, it is essential that the temperature at the tip is about the same as it is at the magnet, further inside of the tip. This means that a material such as copper is used for the tip - its an excellent conductor of heat. The snag is, that you cant have copper when youre doing proper solder joints, as it will contaminate the joint and cause an alloy to be formed that is brittle and will fail. Well do another article on how a soldering iron tip is made - but basically there are some very thin layers of material that are laid on top of the copper to make a soldering iron work. One of the WORST things you can do (apart from scraping/filing or any other mechanical issues) is to use a WET sponge to clean the tip with. The instant temperature drop caused by excess water means that the outer layers will crack, exposing the copper core of the soldering iron to the joint, resulting in long term problems.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Mar 2014 16:00:01 +0000
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