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Skills and Tools
You need decent small electronics soldering skills and a temperature controlled iron.
The below are good guides and examples of the soldering technique to use and the results you are aiming for. Somewhat less pristine results than that will also work, provided you use flux first and heat the joints, not just the solder. I found the SOT23 diodes less work than through-hole or single SMT diodes, but any SMT requires a more delicate touch and thin solder if you want it looking very nice with minimal sloped sides. A bit clunkier of a job is not much different than good through-hole work.
A bit of magnification to see the details of the solder joint as it is being created is also helpful for those with more than 20 year old eyes.
Some introductory guides may help those who have not done small soldering.
- Adafruit: Guide To Excellent Soldering
- SparkFun:
These videos cover tools and through-hole and SMT soldering.
- BEST Norman Meir:
- Lead Free SOT23 Installation Shows soldering the diodes' SOT23 format using 0.5mm SAC305 solder and a conical tip.
- EEVblog:
- Soldering Tutorial Part 1 - Tools
- Soldering Tutorial Part 2 - Though Hole on flux and heating the pad and pin, bad joints, solder wick. For the sockets, TRRS and switches. Up to 25:20, plus end summary at 32:20.
- Soldering Tutorial Part 3 - Surface Mount Mostly up to 14:00 for basic tack and solder technique with 0.5 mm solder.
- Mr. SolderFix: (warning: load opening music) - How To Solder SMD Correctly - Part 1 /SMD Soldering Very precise technique, though with 0.25 mm solder for the later fine pitch stuff and I believe the SOT23 as well. Up to 4:30. - How To Use flux / When To Use Flux || Great Tips + Advice General techniques for fixing or cleaning up soldering.
Good tools will help tremendously in building without frustration. Here are some options:
| Tool | Type | US Shops | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Soldering iron | Temperature controlled | Hakko FX-888D Adafruit | $130 |
| Flux | no-clean | Adafruit | $8 |
| Thin solder | 0.5mm recommended | Lead free SAC305 50g Adafruit | $18 |
| Safety Goggles | $10 | ||
| Tweezers | cross-lock | Sparkfun | $4 |
| Magnifier on stand | 4x is helpful | Adafruit | $6 |
| Solder wick | Adafruit | $3 | |
| Fume extractor fan | Adafruit | $9 | |
| Good lighting |
A portable iron that people like is the Pinecil or the TS100. They are less expensive, though you would need to add a power supply (or a powerful laptop charger), stand, and brass wire ball, and possibly a set of tips instead of the default one.
Additional tools that are nice to have:
| Tool | Type | US Shops | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Silicon solder work pad | SparkFun, Adafruit | $10 | |
| Keycap puller | Amazon | $5 | |
| Solder sucker | Engineer Adafruit $18, Basic (harder to use) Adafruit $5 | $18 | |
| Flush diagonal cutters | Adafruit | $7 | |
| Multimeter | simple for any debugging | Adafruit | $25 |