Just realized my soldering iron tip was 40 degrees off for months

I was having trouble getting clean joints on some Canon shutter wires, and after like 6 months of struggling I finally checked my Hakko station with a temp probe. Turns out it was reading 350C but actually hitting 310C. That tiny difference was why my solder kept balling up on the pads. Has anyone else had their station drift that much without noticing?

2 comments

2 Comments

mary_wells20d ago

Yeah that temp drift is a killer, I had the same thing with my Weller and it took me forever to figure out why my joints looked like crap.

beth_ward8017d ago

My Weller WES51 did the exact same thing and I actually got mad enough to email the company about it. It's funny how a tiny temperature drift can mess up an entire project and you just assume you're doing something wrong. It reminds me of my old oven at home where the actual temp was like 25 degrees off from what it said on the dial. You'd think after a certain price point accuracy would be a given but apparently not.