The Great Soldering Iron Saga
Apr 8, 2010 Gear
Posted by
irfon
Well, last night when I was so frustrated with my cheap soldering iron, I threw it in the trash. Well, I waited for it to cool and then threw it in the trash. My trash bin is metal and was empty and I mostly did it out of frustration.
I thought about it a lot overnight. Today I thought, “Okay, I will look at it and figure out if there’s anything I can do to improve its performance, and if I still think it’s useless, I’ll buy a new one.”
However, just like people who store important documents in their computer’s recycling bin (yes, people really do this), I left it there figuring that I just fish it out this evening.
Today was also the day that our cleaning service person comes. Helpfully, she took out the trash.
So… I guess that decides that! New soldering iron for me!
April 9th, 2010 at 1:39 pm
If you don’t want to spend $150 on a new iron, you could maybe look at some of the less expensive Weller irons. The WP25 25-watt iron looks decent at first glance, though I don’t have any experience with it personally – and should only cost about $50 or less.
A quick google shows many DIY people recommending the WP25 as “an excellent first iron” and “the gold standard for many years”. Might be worth a look!
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