• Welcome to Overclockers Forums! Join us to reply in threads, receive reduced ads, and to customize your site experience!

Tiny soldering - How I do it.

Overclockers is supported by our readers. When you click a link to make a purchase, we may earn a commission. Learn More.
four4875 said:
plus i dont think it can be had at radioshack (at least not my local one) so i wouldnt want to include it in here, its supposed to be somethin anyone can easily get the tools for and do, so if they have to searc around for flux, it becomes a pain in the rump.
Radioshack does sell it but it's the non-spill kind:
http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog_name=CTLG&product_id=64-022
Both lowes and homedepot only sell water soluble flux (looks white) that's mostly used for plumbing soldering. It's not recommended for electronic work because it is conductive.

g0dM@n said:
You know all those TINY, LITTLE electronic things on your mobos, vid cards, etc? Yes, that's what I'm playing with!
Assembly machine machine usually does these things, correct? Science channel had this piece on how computer motherboards and cards are made: the card is slightly dipped in molten solder and, voila, every component soldered. Virtually no human involvement except for placement of some components.
 
he just said the assembly machine occasionally misplaces them :p

its one thing to strick 'em in place, but use an off the shelf radioshack iron to solder them ion place :p

I know my local RS dont have the sflux, ive searched, and i dunno wabout others, havnt been to any others.
 
I troubleshoot & solder all day long, through hole & SMT (surface mount technology) PCB (Modules & Panels)

Yes there is a soldering machine Its called "wave soldering" all components are loaded into the pcb using other machines that are programmed to load the components into the right circuit/node then humans load all other components that the machines cannot load which are many) then the pcb with the components is passed into the wave solder machine which heats everything, including the board, then the bottom of the board travels over a molten hot solder pool that just skims the bottom of the board & components which instantly solders everything, the solder only sticks to the metal & not the pcb, then it travels out to a slow cooling station, Problem is that the machines & the humans loading all the components are not perfect so then that's where I come in, we locate solder bridges (shorts), overvolted circuits usualy a resister missing or wrong ohm in circuit, components loaded in wrong direction in circuit, IC's with bent or lifted contacts ETC ETC..........

So first you have to locate the problem then desolder components & replace & solder cleanly then benchtest some of the modules & panels Its Interesting & tedious work sometimes I want to snap the freaking modules in half cuz it can be frustrating you have to have allot of patients which sometimes I run out of :)

Some tools we use are

Dental Pic
Exzacto Knife
Small Brushes (that we trim very short for cleaning flux off solder joints & pcb with Alcohol.)
No-Clean Liquid Flux
Rubbing Alcohol

Soldering Iron
Desoldering tool (basically a soldering iron that has vacuum in the tip)

Its tedious work been wanting to do a vmod on my ic7g but I cant afford another one so I'm always reluctant to do it.

At work if I botch something there's more of the same part, at home If I pull a trace or burn an IC Ill be offline for a good long while :(

This is an awesome mobo would hate to screw it up
Maybe Ill get some backbone & take my mobo to work & do the vmod after hours.
I really need to do the modd cuz my ram is starving for voltage
 
Last edited:
g0dM@n said:
You guys have no idea as to what I've been up to all day/night. I'm at my job putting together electric boards... it's been about 14 hours and i'm still goin. We have a HUGE shipment tomorrow of 2200 electronic interfaces, and all weekend ppl have been working.

The pick-and-place machine that puts all the tiny resistors/transistors/diodes onto the electric boards is not placing all of them completely perfect, so I have to look over them and fix them with insanely fine tweezers and a magnifying lens.

You know all those TINY, LITTLE electronic things on your mobos, vid cards, etc? Yes, that's what I'm playing with!

Who do you work for ?

I work at DMP (Digital Monitoring Products) (Alarms & fire)
http://dmp.com/gestalt/go.cfm?objectid=F64282D6-6C12-11D5-94A60020781CE8D5
 
my grandpa gave me a tip for soldering once. he told me that if the head is too fat for the soldering you are doing get some (prefferably) copper wire (about 1 mm thick and pretty sturdy do it doesn't bend on its own) wrap it around the soldering thingy a few times and then make it go forward so it sticks outin front of the soldering tip.
and vwalla! an instand 1 mm thick soldering head.

sorry for the poor grammar and stuff. im tired.
 
cozmo_d said:
Yes there is a soldering machine Its called "wave soldering" all components are loaded into the pcb using other machines that are programmed to load the components into the right circuit/node then humans load all other components that the machines cannot load which are many) then the pcb with the components is passed into the wave solder machine which heats everything, including the board, then the bottom of the board travels over a molten hot solder pool that just skims the bottom of the board & components which instantly solders everything, the solder only sticks to the metal & not the pcb, then it travels out to a slow cooling station,

at work i have run the solder wave and one thing that we have to do is put flux on the hand load parts like the dimm slots and pci slots to make sure that all the pins get solder on them. There is also a oven that the boards go through when the SMT parts get put on the board and melts the solder paste that the SMT parts are sitting on and all the parts get soldered at one time. I wish i had one of the rework station that we have at work cause the temp of the iron is controled by which tip is being used
 
cozmo_d said:
we locate solder bridges (shorts), overvolted circuits usualy a resister missing or wrong ohm in circuit, components loaded in wrong direction in circuit, IC's with bent or lifted contacts ETC ETC..........
In that piece, the Science channel (sorry I'm only a hobby solderer) also showed the testing/QC phase - also done by a machine - nothing mechanical, just put the card in the regular pc (I think it was a pci modem :D) and run a test program

threeme2189 said:
my grandpa gave me a tip for soldering once. he told me that if the head is too fat for the soldering you are doing get some (prefferably) copper wire (about 1 mm thick and pretty sturdy do it doesn't bend on its own) wrap it around the soldering thingy a few times and then make it go forward so it sticks outin front of the soldering tip.
and vwalla! an instand 1 mm thick soldering head.
I thought about doing the same thing in order avoid buying those specialty irons. But my idea was to use a needle. Copper is better though because the needle didn't tin that well. But like I said before, in most cases it's not the size of the tip that matters, it's how you use it.
 
i have tried to modify a stock tip by stickin it in a drill press and filing it down to a better tip, worked like a ghetto lathe. i think this killed the nickel plated finish and the tip wore out extremely fast.
 
Locating SMBus on asus P5GD2

Does anyone know how to access the SMBus on an Asus P5GD2 mb. Thx - FG

I've found some info about using memory slots. I was hoping to find a method using a pci card, parallel port, or existing header. Still searching.
 
Last edited:
while this isnt really the place to ask (should have been in a new thread)

i started an effort to build a PCB to interface to SMbus via ram slot, but with my TERRIBLE attention span, i stopped putting forth effort after a few days.

i may pick up the project in around 4 months like i tend to do, for maybe a week tops. so reallyim not that viable of a source for info. ram is the only place i really know of to tap in at, possibly around the PLL IC, but thats all i can suggest.
 
guys, i've been reading four's guide for months. i finally did the vdd mod on my nf7 board and man, IT WORKS! i didn't kill my board. all the tips on how to solder in four's guide were so helpful along with enduros nf7 vdd guide.

thanks for your guide four. now i'm of to do the vdimm mod and vtt mod if i can actually find a vtt mod link that works.

this newb does read the stickies :)
 
what is tinning? also, is super glue conductive at all? also, should i bother getting a new tip for my dual wattage radioshack iron? do they make smaller tips? thanks, great guide, i appricate it
 
tinning is when you heat the wire, and feed solder to it, and the flux in the solder will like penetrate the wires and then burn off, and when it burns off it sucks solder into the wire. its basically getting the wire nice and prepared so its easy to get a nice solder joint.

when you tin the tip of your iron, you clean it off and get a nice thin layer of solder on there. this helps get easy thermal joints between the tip and what you'r trying to solder, and prevents the tip from oxidizing nad makes it last longer.

the super glue that i used wasnt conductive. i stuck a drop on a piece of paper and stuck the multimeter in it to test it once, and it wasnt anything my multimeter could register.

i dont remember if the tip on the dual wattage is the longer one that has liek a 45 degree taper on the end or if its the one with a long taper, but i foind out that while the one with a longer taper seemed better at first, it had a little flat spot on the end, where the other one came to an actual point. i know the one that ended up working out best was liek the stock one that comes on a 30 watt iron. i dont remember which tips came with what any more lol.

if you want to try, you can put a tip in a drill and file it down to a really fine point (drill acting like a lathe), but this murders the nickel plating and the tip will like desintigrate itself after a while.
 
four4875 said:
son, i had one of them that i lost somewhere in a move. i tihnk its in a storage unit. but this ine seems to get a bit better magnification, which is good for lookin for bridged pins. arent they less tha $20 at RS? i have a different branded one, with a levered suction base thingy, it looks like its about 20 years old, and i got it from my dad, so it probably is.
i knew a place were u can get one of those for like 2bucks :(
 
I need a magnifying glass... anywhere cheap, reliable? I'd probably rather order cuz i'm lazy and don't wanna go shopping... i'd take advice on online shopping and local shopping, though. :)
 
Are you looking for a cheap magnifying lense? I bought two in a package at my local Ace for $1.00 if I recall. A large one that sits near my new WES51 Weller soldering station, and another slightly smaller one that is in my toolbox. Most smallish hard-ware stores carry that "made in china" $1.00 rack. I find lots of little usefuls in there. Saves my eyes the strain of trying to read small print on motherboards :).

- Jim
 
I remember doing vmods for my NF7S with a HUGE soldering GUN with at least a half inch thick tip and some really heavy guage flux filled solder. God, that tried my patience, but it was all I had and I got it to work.
 
Man, even with this guide I can't hold the iron steady enough to get down there and simply "touch" the wire. Any tips for someone with tremors? :bang head
 
Back