Homemade Hot Air Soldering Iron

Attach the air tubing to the TEE and the air pump.

Homemade hot air soldering iron. Let go with the tweezers. Looking for a good soldering iron. J1 is a mini-USB jack R3 and R4 are 0805 resistors C1 C4 and C5 are 0805 capacitors and U1 is a TSSOP16 USB-to-UART converter.

The hot air gun is identical to a soldering iron as it heats up the soldering lead to secure the component on the board. For this size of chip surface tension will actually snap it perfectly into place unless there are shorts in the solder. I have real hot air tools so maybe Im spoiled.

It includes an air pump with digital controls hot air wand and suction pickup tool. Using tweezers to apply gentle pressure against the device it quickly loosens up and falls off. The soldering iron seems to work absolutely flawlessly.

It stops after a while. The project is this. As you see there are only seven component locations shown in the photographs but the variety will be sufficient to demonstrate basic hot-air soldering techniques.

Hot air guns are usually expensive depending on the brand and where you buy it. DIY Hot Air Soldering Iron Link. I often use a soldering iron to solder SOT-23 SO-8 and even occasionally TFQP-64 packages.

Im wondering when and if I need to upgrade. This hot air soldering iron is not limited to SMT surface mount technology devices or super thin soldering wire. Aug 8 2013 3.