Comment on Smolderin station recommendation

Thorry84@feddit.nl ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

I’ve used my old Aoyue 968A+ rework station for 10+ (maybe going on 15, not sure) years now and I’m very happy with it. It has excellent power in a comfortable grip with standard tips so you can switch around easily enough (although I just have a small point tip which is a good allrounder). It has enough power to deal with floodfill and ground planes without crashing the temperature, but still enough control to not overshoot and go way too hot.

It has fume extraction, but that’s kinda weak, they just added it because they could I guess. The suction bit can get in the way, but it’s easily removed when it does.

The best part is it also has an excellent SMD rework hot air, again with a comfortable grip and lots of tips included. It’s easily adjustable in both temperature and airflow. I use it to pre-heat (and add heat) when soldering large components, for example on old retro motherboards. This way I can get away with lower temperatures when desoldering stuff, preventing lifting pads or damaging traces. It works great for SMD as well, but for larger PCBs I combine it with a cheap hotplate I modified to pre-heat the PCB.

It’s Chinese made, but made well, more of a high-end Chinese model and is easily gotten for around $150. I’ve used it for thousands of hours and it has never let me down.

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