Our new gear arrived and is ready for use. Please keep the benches clean took me 30 minutes to put up the tools and clean the benches.
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looks super nice and clean now
We have now put out small spools of solder and solder wick. These are expensive items and they kept disappearing. FYI, a 1lb roll of solder is $28-$32 bucks, use what you need but try to minimize waste.
To Hakko FX-951 soldering stations will go to sleep so we don’t have to worry about leaving these on.
You can tell of the station is on but the unit is asleep by the SLP on the display:
Please leave the blue key in the unit. It allows you to adjust the parameters like temp, sleep options, etc.
And you can tell the tip may be hot by the light in the handle:
The tip is turned off each time the iron is placed in the holder. When you remove it the tip is heated, when you hear a beep it is up to temp. About a second or two.
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What is the difference between the Hakko and the Metcal stations?
About like Chevy vs Cadillac.
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While I liked the Metcals. Too many people left them on or had issues with 2-3 power switches. Plus they could not sink enough heat for large connections.
The Hakko’s auto sleep and the temp can be adjusted without swapping tips.
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Soooooo…
Largly just a badge?
And double MSRP?
More like 4-5 x MSRP.
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Metcals are fantastic irons. There is really nothing better for doing teeny tiny SMD work. That said, I suspect the majority of the use the DMS irons were getting was not teeny tiny SMD work, and for more usual soldering work the Metcal doesn’t get you anything other than a quick heat-up time. If you have the correct tips (which cost about $25 each), you can absolutely solder huge battery lugs. The Metcal can dump about 40W of heat into a tip. But tips are delicate, and public use irons tend to be subject to abuse. I’d much rather let the $1 Hakko tip get abused than the $25 Metcal tip. Much cheaper to replace.
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I have been paying about $10 per tip for my Hakko. Do you have a better source? (Please, please).
Yep, Metcals are better suited to a production environment where they can be tuned for whatever they are doing. And they know how to properly take care of them. Doesn’t help we have 3 different models of Metcals. Tips are $25-40, someone decided to grind down several of them. No bueno!
Hakko has some features I love like auto-sleep, programable curves. Also heat just as fast and the tips are $12-$20.
I had my personal cheapie Hakko FX-888 in the eLab and it survived pretty well with constant use. We can get 2.5x Hakko FX-951 irons ($230) for the price of one new Metcal MX-500UF ($580).
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Dunno which one you have, but:
It’s Ali, so your mileage will vary, but you can’t argue with those prices…
Perhaps we have other more important issues if people are stealing solder, but if people leave solder on the tip when they finish using it rather than mindlessly wiping it before putting it back in the holder*, the tips will not oxidize and will last much longer. It is difficult and somewhat time consuming to get a tip back from that state.
Wipe it off when you take it out, not when you put it back (unless you got plastic on it or something [BAD MEMBER!] ).
*I am constantly guilty of this, but it’s a bad habit.
Thanks Lampy for making the eLab a place where I can come and get actual work done. The microscope and clean work areas are especially useful!
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I know it may seem bad but we do go through A LOT of solder. I’m not sure it was maliciously stolen but it is easy to pack up your stuff and end up with small tools, rolls of solder and wire, etc. 
For now we are splitting up the 1lb rolls of solder into 4-5 smaller rolls. I will keep an eye on the supplies but since I only make it down 1-2 times a week, you will have to let me know if the spools on the benches are running out. You can post here on talk or email me: [email protected]
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