Just realized my soldering iron tip was the problem all along

I spent like 3 months fighting with cold joints on wire repairs at work. Replaced my whole setup, tried different fluxes, even blamed the board itself. Then last week I swapped out the old tip on my Hakko for a new one and it was night and day. The old tip was oxidized way worse than I thought after about 200 hours of use. Has anyone else had a tool issue that was hiding in plain sight like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

abby_cooper3d ago

I used to be the person who blamed the flux or the board every time. Then I swapped tips on my Weller after a year of heavy use and couldn't believe the difference. The old tip looked fine but had this invisible crust that made every joint a disaster. Now I keep a brand new tip in my drawer for when things start going weird. It saved me so much headache and wasted time.

evan5433d ago

How often do you clean your tip with brass wool versus just swapping it out?