[hpsdr] Atlas, How do I hand solder this thing?

[kd7nm]

Another thought in dealing with SMT with hot air -
especially for the fuses (whoops, I mean chips!) with lots
of legs/pins.  A way to move the part off the board that
greatly reduces the risk of bringing PC pats and traces
along with it is to slide a piece of music wire in
underneath/behind a row of pins.  By music wire, I'm
thinking of fine stainless steel wire, say 36-gauge.  Once
that's in place, start heating the component, while exerting
a small amount of upward pressure on the part - enough to
put some spring tension on the part, so that once the solder
liquifies, the part lifts up and/or flips over.  This is a
technique I used in a past commercial technician life, in
concert with a hot air pencil.  But if the hot air gun is
actually hot enough to desolder, this reduces risk to the
chip and board, since the part moves pretty much as soon as
possible, and signals the end of need to apply heat.

I'll be tackling mine when the parts from TAPR arrive, and
I'm surely looking forward to it!

73, Bob, KD7NM


----- Original Message Follows -----
From: Thompson_Peter at emc.com
To: bill at ewjt.com, merickse at tampabay.rr.com, hpsdr at hpsdr.org
Subject: Re: [hpsdr] Atlas, How do I hand solder this thing?
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2006 07:12:26 -0400

>***** High Performance Software Defined Radio Discussion
>List *****
>
>The hot air gun approach looks interesting however, I see
>in the photos on the web site that a cup warmer is used to
>raise the temp of the board before applying heat from the
>gun.  In the example shown, the board is small enough to
>fit on the surface of the warmer plate but I don't think
>such a plate is big enough to accommodate the Atlas board. 
>Questions: how essential is it to 'pre-warm' the board
>before applying heat with the gun?  Is the gun capable of
>getting the job done on its own? 
>
>Pete, N3EVL
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: hpsdr-bounces at hpsdr.org 
>> [mailto:hpsdr-bounces at hpsdr.org] On Behalf Of Bill Tracey
>> Sent: Sunday, June 18, 2006 2:18 PM
>> To: Mark Ericksen; hpsdr at hpsdr.org
>> Subject: Re: [hpsdr] Atlas, How do I hand solder this
>> thing? 
><snip>
>
>> Tools for Hot air gun soldering
>> 
>> A hot air gun  - I use a Stampabilities heat gun ( 
>>
>http://cgi.ebay.com/STAMPABILITIES-HEAT-EMBOSSING-GUN-APPLIQUE
>>
>>
>-POWDERS_W0QQitemZ8282797047QQcategoryZ16504QQcmdZViewItem
>> )  This gun us on special from Hobby lobby for $10 or so 
>> pretty frequently. 
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