comments:
I learned how to properly solder when I was 17 which was many decades ago. Back then, soldering irons were not complicated, and many did not have temperature adjustments. The higher the wattage, the hotter the iron seemed to get. Some were even butane fueled with very little adjustment. Since you already solder, you understand that the metal workpiece must get hot enough for the solder to melt, so the workpiece (in our case pads and wires) must be hot enough to melt the solder. The iron heats the metal workpiece (not melts the solder directly), so the iron just needs to be able to heat the metal. My iron is a 60 Watt AC powered (I don't trust a battery powered one to provide sufficient wattage) with a temperature adjustment (which I have locked at 425 C degrees) that I bought on Amazon maybe 10 or 15 years ago. It gets hot and has never let me down. THIS ONE looks similar to mine but is a higher wattage (Good) and has more features. There are a whole bunch of them. When I bought mine, I just picked one. I wouldn't spend a bunch of money on one and certainly would not by one of those fancy-dancy stations with bells, whistles, and gauges for everything. I am practical and functional. Since you already solder, you really know how to do it. Maybe just a couple of pointers. First, I use 63/37 alloy Kester brand rosin core solder (yeah, a bit costly, but damn well worth it). The 63/37 allow is eutectic and becomes liquid at precisely 183 C degrees. The 60/40 alloy starts getting pasty about 183 or so but does not fully liquify until 188 or 190 C degrees. Yes, it will work, just be sure that is it fully liquified. I use, what I call, the solder first method. After putting flux on a pad, I touch the solder feed to one corner first, then the iron on the diagonal corner. When that pad hits 183 C degrees, the solder will melt, flow towards the iron (the heat), cover the pad, and mound up in the center. Remove the heat and the solder feed. Even though my iron is set at 425 C degrees, how hot did the pad actually get? Somewhere between 183 and 200 C degrees if that. As you know, it takes some time (dwell time) for the heat to transfer and the pad to heat up. The solder first method prevents overheating the pad. The higher iron temp helps to reduce heat dissipation throughout the board. That should pretty much do it.