14-12-2020, 08:50 PM
131
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by mart
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Radio Rentals supplied us with Adcola soldering irons. 240v for the houses, 24v for benchwork. They worked well.When I went self-employed, I bought a Weller mains iron for use in houses, plus a soldering gun. The soldering gun was used for soldering that needed quite a bit of heat and where delicate soldering wasn't required.
It had another use too. The transformer in it has quite a strong magnetic field. Strong enough to use for degaussing the shadow mask in colour TV CRTs. The idea was to do the degaussing fairly quickly before the soldering tip glowed red hot.
I've still got that soldering gun but don't use it for either purpose anymore.For bench work, I had a Weller TCP 24v 50w iron. A super iron it was too. A magnetic bit that gave it temperature control. It worked for many years but went wrong shortly after I stopped work. I bought an Antex 660TC to replace it. It has its own transformer with a temperature dial. I use this now and it's OK but not a patch on the Weller.
Solder wick was/is essential for repair work. You had to be able to remove components without damaging the print and solder wick was the stuff to use. For solder removal that didn't need so much care, there was the solder sucker. It got nicknamed the 'foop-tah' because of the noise in made when sucking the solder up.
Good soldering and print care is a skill all on its own don't you think?
Edit: Forgot to mention flux remover to make the print look nice after changing components.
I had considered getting a transformer to vary the heat of my Antex iron. I'm assuming that I could insert it between the mains supply and the cable of the iron itself, but I'm not sure whether that's possible.
I did try to reduce the heat of the soldering iron by moving the tip out about an inch or two, which was quite easy to do, to give me a little more control. I read that somewhere. However, it didn't make a great deal of difference.
14-12-2020, 09:12 PM
132
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by OldGreyFox
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Sounds good Besoeker, The bloke who comes to service our boiler has one and when I saw it I thought I've got to get me one of those. It would be great for soldering stuff in the car without the need for long extension cables getting trapped in the door, and burning holes in the seats......It has been done!....
Many of our variable speed drive systems are in suites. About a dozen or more usually. The individual drives are front and back so wall sockets for soldering irons can be a bit of a pain with leads trailing like spaghetti. Hence the gas soldering irons!
14-12-2020, 09:42 PM
133
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by JBR
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That's interesting. I assume that with a built-in transformer it would have been quite heavy.I had considered getting a transformer to vary the heat of my Antex iron. I'm assuming that I could insert it between the mains supply and the cable of the iron itself, but I'm not sure whether that's possible.
I did try to reduce the heat of the soldering iron by moving the tip out about an inch or two, which was quite easy to do, to give me a little more control. I read that somewhere. However, it didn't make a great deal of difference.
Here is the sad state of my soldering equipment. The soldering gun doesn't even have a bit in it. The big orange thing is the solder sucker. It looks like a toy but it works well. One advantage to the bright colour was that it never got left behind in customers houses. Stood out like a sore thumb when packing the tools away.
Edit: The 24v Weller with the magnetic tip that I mentioned ran off a big mains isolating transformer that had a 24v tapping. Although the iron has gone, I've still got the transformer.
14-12-2020, 10:00 PM
134
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by OldGreyFox
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Breaking News......
After completing the soldering and installation of all the components to the circuit board, it was time to test the circuit.
Carefully applying the voltage in steps and watching power consumption (any faults would show up as either short circuit or open circuit as the amperage increased) I reached the working voltage of 9 volt DC with a consumption of around 100mA.
After offering a metal object to the coil.......It worked!....
There is still a lot of work to do, and this was just the first preliminary test. An enclosure needs to be made now to house the electronics, and the coil tidied up and modified. I saw no point in spending time on streamlining the coil if the circuit didn't work.
To say I was delighted would be an understatement.....I get so much pleasure from constructing these projects, even though I could have bought one much more efficient and professional, but what would I have learned?....
14-12-2020, 10:18 PM
135
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Some really good posts about soldering chaps. I agree with JB and Fruitcake about the lead in the solder, there are just some things that are necessary. I mainly use flux cored 18 gauge solder for work on the veroboard, I find the antex 15watt just about right for the intricate work, but the Weller in Mart's photo is exactly the same as the one I use for the larger jobs. I used to salvage parts from broken electronic appliances and together with donations gratefully received from Besoeker
I have created a very comprehensive collection of Resistors, capacitors, transformers and other various sundries.I enjoy plumbing jobs around the house, but a butane blowtorch is the preferred method of heat with piping, and some heavy gauge solder.
14-12-2020, 10:34 PM
136
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by mart
->
Well done! You must be well into the tidying up stage now? Do you think you will be heading to the nearest field before Christmas?
There is still the search coil to streamline and fit to the shaft.I doubt it will be functional before Christmas, it's the thinking and design that takes the time.....I try to account for all eventualities.
You might be interested in these photos I took with the digital microscope Mart..The finished circuit...
I think the pictures from the microscope are better than those I took with the camera. This last shot was taken with the camera, although I might not have got the lighting right....
14-12-2020, 10:53 PM
137
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
When I was eight or so, the council put in new street lights and Teed the power off an underground cable. They dug a trench to run the cable, about the diameter of my (adult) wrist, along the side of the road and made the Tee joint in the pavement by the side of our next-door neighbours hedge.They cut a piece out of the existing cable, and laid the two ends plus the new cable into the bottom half of a T-shaped clay tray/half-pipe sort of jobby before baring the ends and then applying paste that I now realise was probably flux.
They then put a metal pot onto a gas burner and started bunging large sticks of solder into it. Once it was all melted they got a ladle and poured the solder into the clay jobby before putting the top half on.
Then they got another bucket and cut open a tin cube of pitch before melting that on the burner, then poured it all over the clay ensuring the ends and the joints were sealed.
Filling in the hole was just as much fun, using a dirty great road thumber that was effectively a single-cylinder motorbike engine with a huge lump of metal attached to the con-rod.
The operator pulled a trigger, it fired, shooting the top half of the machine up into the air. The piston and metal lump retracted whilst the whole thing was still rising before it all came down with a reverberating thump. The "driver" would steer it by pulling or pushing it whilst it was air-born.
Steel toed boots were essential.
Now, how big a smouldering iron do think you would need to do that job?
14-12-2020, 11:04 PM
138
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by mart
->
Not too heavy and the transformer had to be right next to the glass screen (metal shadow mask just behind it) for the degaussing to work. The trouble is that the copper bit heated up enough to melt solder in a few seconds, so a quick degauss was desirable.Here is the sad state of my soldering equipment. The soldering gun doesn't even have a bit in it. The big orange thing is the solder sucker. It looks like a toy but it works well. One advantage to the bright colour was that it never got left behind in customers houses. Stood out like a sore thumb when packing the tools away.
Edit: The 24v Weller with the magnetic tip that I mentioned ran off a big mains isolating transformer that had a 24v tapping. Although the iron has gone, I've still got the transformer.
No the transformer I was thinking of would be to reduce the mains voltage slightly, rather than down to 24V, to reduce the heat of my existing soldering iron.
14-12-2020, 11:04 PM
139
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by Fruitcake
->
When I was eight or so, the council put in new street lights and Teed the power off an underground cable. They dug a trench to run the cable, about the diameter of my (adult) wrist, along the side of the road and made the Tee joint in the pavement by the side of our next-door neighbours hedge.They cut a piece out of the existing cable, and laid the two ends plus the new cable into the bottom half of a T-shaped clay tray/half-pipe sort of jobby before baring the ends and then applying paste that I now realise was probably flux.
They then put a metal pot onto a gas burner and started bunging large sticks of solder into it. Once it was all melted they got a ladle and poured the solder into the clay jobby before putting the top half on.
Then they got another bucket and cut open a tin cube of pitch before melting that on the burner, then poured it all over the clay ensuring the ends and the joints were sealed.
Filling in the hole was just as much fun, using a dirty great road thumber that was effectively a single-cylinder motorbike engine with a huge lump of metal attached to the con-rod.
The operator pulled a trigger, it fired, shooting the top half of the machine up into the air. The piston and metal lump retracted whilst the whole thing was still rising before it all came down with a reverberating thump. The "driver" would steer it by pulling or pushing it whilst it was air-born.
Steel toed boots were essential.
Now, how big a smouldering iron do think you would need to do that job?
14-12-2020, 11:06 PM
140
Re: Foxy's Latest Project.
Originally Posted by OldGreyFox
->
Some really good posts about soldering chaps. I agree with JB and Fruitcake about the lead in the solder, there are just some things that are necessary.
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