Alt-BEAM Archive
Message #12013
To: beam@sgiblab.sgi.com
From: "Timothy Flytch" flytch@hotmail.com
Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 22:46:51 PST
Subject: [alt-beam] Re: solder
>How long should a soldering iron tip last? And what
>can I do to make it last longer?
I find my tips last almost indefinitely*... I never turn on my iron without
first filling my spunge with water... I keep a water bottle on my bench just
for this... I then wipe the tip on the spunge as it heats up and tin it with
fresh solder... The failures I have is when the plating on the tip wears
through... This varies with soldering techniques... If you drag your tip as
you solder then the plating wears out... concentrate on this aspect the next
time you are soldiering... Try just to lightly touch the tip to the lead and
pad with little sliding motion... control the shape of the joint with the
solder not the tip...
*about three months when I'm doing production...
Timothy...
______________________________________________________
12014 Thu, 16 Mar 2000 23:17:18 -0800 [alt-beam] Re: A little irrelevant.................. "Dane Gardner" Steve,
I've also considered leaving the list. I've learned very little from this
list as it is mostly people asking simple electronics questions. Not that
it's a bad thing...it's just that I'm a little beyond the basics. Maybe the
answer would be to have another list. One that allows the more advanced
BEAMer's a chance to discuss their passions and thoughts without having to
stop and explain the basics in order to talk about the advanced stuff. We
seem to have hit a brick wall with developments lately. I see people
spending more time explaining that if you increase a resistor or a cap in an
RC circuit you increase the time it takes for the cap to charge, when they
should be using that biological neural net for something that pushes it's
limit. Think about the future, not perpetually reviewing the past. Damn,
I'm ranting...sorry. Yes, I think that an 'ADVANCED' BEAM mailing list would
be a good solution to the problem, but how are we going to determine who
gets on it? Set up a test? Or go by who has been here the longest? Or
just allow anybody on...but refuse to answer the 'basic' questions? How do
you segregate (bad word, but the only one I can think of) the two? How do
we discern who is worthy and who is new? Either way...if someone wants to
start one up, I'll be there on the front line!
Dane
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