newbie soldering questions

[klavy69]

OK, Thoroughly frustrated with my efforts tonight. I'm using a weller 140/100 watt iron and get about 6 solders out of a tip before its melted thru on the bottom of the 'head' where the solder flux/acid sits once it beads.
1. is that normal?
2. what is a good wattage iron? (240 watt is next up for weller locally)
3. what kinds of solder should I be using?
4. Can Deans plugs be made any fricken smaller( sarcasm...)
I'm using either a rosin core solder(lead free) for electronics use or a high dollar solder with separate bottle of 'acid' that I used to use in HO slot cars called Stay-Brite(silver based solder). My problem is that I can't seem to get the wire to stick to the 'tabs' of motors or my deans plugs. Seems that I get the wire hot enuf but the tabs dont' get hot enuf to bond.
5. what kind of tips would you recommend after reading this jibberish?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Little stuff like this kicks my butt and then I'll be back to Nitro. Literally took me 3 hours to take a powerpole plug off and put a deans ultra plug on along with taking a motor off that kyosho and put a different motor on. Go ahead and rib me because it is deserved. I was gonna tear apart an end to end battery and put it sidebyside but I gotta figure this out before tearing up batteries if I can't get them back together. Almost got the fricken' welder out and went at it that way .
Thanx for reading my rant if you got this far...
Todd

[PBR Allstar]

Todd,
I've had similar expreiences with weller tips, they just don't last a real long time, althoug you seem to have a pretty extreme case getting so few uses? Here are some of my guidelines for soldering success that work well for me:

Only use acid flux on solid objects, not wires, the flux will travel under the wire sheathing and corrode the wire over time, or the solder will flow up the wire, making it hard and be a potential spot for breakage. (the acid flux may also be shortening your tip life?)

Get a tube of paste flux, they have it at most hardware stores and radio shacks, use that for tinning the wires and tabs

tin both parts if possible prior to joining them (heat the separate parts/wires and get a good flow of solder on each part

keep everything clean! I usually clean the parts with electronic spray prior to soldering them, probably overboard, but it can't hurt and any contamination is only going to make soldering the joint more difficult

keep the tip of your iron clean. most irons come with that little sponge in the tray thing, but if it didn't get a clean kitchen sponge or cloth and get it moist, not soaking wet just moist and clean the tip of your iron on that before every solder, also get it nice and clean before you put it up after you're done using it.

As far as your supplies go, I use thin gauge solder mostly, it's really just a preference thing, I'm not sure what the make up of it is, but it came from radio shack. for the hobbyist I don't think it's super important, just stay away from acid core or anything really heavy that you dug out of the bottom of the plumbing box. I usually use a smaller chisel type tip that's about 1/8" wide, although if I'm doing battery tabs I use one that is about 1/4" wide, and if I'm soldering anything on a board I use a small pencil tip.


Anyway, Like I said, those things work for me pretty well. and if you are in the market for a new soldering iron, there are a lot of nice adjustable, butane powered units out there, I have both a weller and a snap on and they work great on the bench or at the track, if you do go the butane route though, get a good name brand because there is some junk out there.

[Halgar]

You should also scuff the surface of motor tabs and your deans plugs. You'll also find it easier to tin tabs and plugs if you don't try to heat them. Just put the solder on the tip of the iron, then drag the iron across the surface of the tab until you draw the bead off the iron and onto the tab as desired. Same thing with heavier gauge wire, tin the iron tip and drag from housing to wire tip on the wire, once you get a sufficient amount of solder on the wire, hold the iron to the wire and it will flow through all the strands just as slick as you please. After that, it's pretty simple to connect the wire to the tab with minimal iron time, the hard part, as you've already figured out, is holding all the pieces together until the solder sets.

I've gone through a few tips on my Weller too, to minimize this I try to plan out all the solder joints that will have to be done and have everything prepped and ready to go before plugging in the iron and doing business. Once all joints are made, the iron gets unplugged. The less time it's on, the longer the tip is going to last. Also, you can reshape the tips with a drill and some sandpaper. I repoint mine every so often which keeps them clean and more efficient, as well as making it easier to control the tinning process.

[a01butal]

Not a soldering expert by any means so I found instructions from Novak to be helpful especially with selection of the correct solder.

http://www.teamnovak.com/tech_info/how_to/solder/index.html

[badhoopty]

if you dont have one, get the helping hand device thats a weighted base with 2 little arms with clips on the end. it takes ALOT of the frustration out of deans. i got mine at radioshack. just search helping hands on thier website and you will bring it up.

[uzzi]

Hi there,

I reckon the main culprit you have is the type of soldering iron you are using....its the gun type with a trigger. Those were never design to be held on continuosly for anytime longer than 10 secs (hence the burning of the tip). The type of soldering iron you should get is the pencil type with a decent chisel tip (around 4mm width) The amount of wattage should be around 80watts upwards (bigger wattage = bigger tip)

Ideally invest in a soldering station but a good pencil type of soldering iron will do the job as you can leave them on continuosly. As mentioned the tip is very important...more so than the wattage. Chisel type tips will allow you to solder batteries...the wellar 100/140 puny tips will not.

[klavy69]

Cool,
Thanx for all the advice and tips so far. Gladly will be putting some of this to use. Yes I have the trigger type with the puny tip. Will be checking out a new style soon. The helping hand is something I have but didn't think about it being stashed away in my slot car stuff but will definitely be diggin it out today. All is appreciated and hope to be able to tell you guys you produced a 'master solderer' with some practice. Great info from all and thank you very much.
Todd