Who knows how to solder?

[Joe Nerve]

Good! I figured most of you did, so now you can help me.

I'm going to do my first electronic work in years. Throwing dimarzios in a MIM deluxe P later today.

1. When melting the original solder from the pots do I need to have a solder remover of some sort, or can I just heat it up and remove the wires?

2. I'm going to head out to buy one of those soldering iron kits in radio shack. Anything I should know before doing so?

3. Are there any other tips I should know about.

Thanks for yer help.

[harrison_faulkn]

You don't have to remove the solder, but it does help keep everything nice and tidy.

The radio shack soldering kits work fine, even if a bit cheap. If you dont plan on soldering 5 hours a day 5 days a week, they've always worked for me.

One thing to consider is getting some flux though. Normally the rosin core solder takes care of it, but I've always found it to make the solder bond with the pots a ton better. Sometimes without it my joints will break stright off like it never even stuck.

[Phalex]

1. No solder is solder. the new stuff will stick to the old just fine. If you have a big solder booger, clean up the excess, otherwise don't worry about it.

2. A medium duty iron should be fine. If you are soldering to the metal case on the back of a pot, a heavy duty iron will give you more heat to do that. (Be careful not to get too crazy with the heat on the terminals.)

3. Get a small blob of solder on the end of the tip of the iron, and use it to heat the part you are soldering until the solder melts on the piece you want to solder. Don't just stick a ball of solder on top of the terminal, it should flow into the wire and terminal connection.

Make a good physical connection between the parts you are soldering: solder is not glue.

Make sure the connections you have soldered do not move until the solder has solidified.

[Beyer160]

1. The right way to do it is to remove all the solder from the pots using a solder sucker or desoldering braid, and apply new solder when you solder in the new wires. You're not supposed to re-use solder, but I admit to having done it before, as I'm sure others here have too.

2. Those cheapie kits are fine for oneoffs or occasional use, but if you think you'll use it more than a couple times a year you should invest in a Weller variable temp station.

3. Heat the work, not the solder. Tin the ends of the wires (coat them with solder) before soldering to the pots. Take notes as to how the original pickup was wired, so if you run into trouble you'll have something to refer back to.

Soldering pickups is easy once you get the hang of it- relax and enjoy!

[Dbassmon]

You can buy a solder sucker which will remove molten solder.
I just hit the component on a work bench top and inertia removes the molten solder. Be careful though.

I would suggest using the minimum amount of heat necessary to do the job.

Make sure that solder has completely married the wire end, you may start by "tinning the wire". Make sure that wire and terminal remain completely still while the solder cools, otherwise you will end up with an intermittent or "cold" solder joint.

[JackANSI]

1. A little extra usually never hurts, but keep it clean, no big boogers on top of boogers.. Remove it all if it gets like that.

2. If you can't do the work inside an instrument (pots, wires, jacks, and terminals) with a 25W iron, you're just going to destroy stuff with a bigger iron (usually anyway.. Unless the part you're soldering to is bigger than the wattage and reserve heat of the iron will allow you to solder).

3. Use the right size solder. Usually the fine stuff works best for me, like 0.8mm. i bought a 500g spool of that stuff about 3 or 4 years ago and I still have it. I probably do an hour or two worth of soldering a week too (mainly circuit board work that doesn't take a lot)

Keep a clean tip on your iron. You can solder with a nasty dirty tip as long as you can get heat out of it and into the part. But soldering is WAY easier with a clean tip.

Let the iron heat up right. Don't just dive in there when the tip starts to melt the solder. Give it ample time to build a reserve of heat (7-10 minutes before your first solder joint is my rule). I like to do the back of the pot first, then the terminals, after about 5 minutes of warming up between pots.

Resist the urge to have a fan blowing across the work and iron (this will remove heat from where you want it).

If you can't hold the wire 2" from the end you're soldering, stop. Try again after you turn the fan off and/or let the iron heat up a bit longer. Maybe even try a bigger tip to store more heat or even thinner solder.

Q-tip and rubbing alcohol. Clean the back of the pots with it, get the dust, finger grime, cigarette smoke residue, etc off before you even start. Flux's main purpose is to remove oxidation, prevent oxidation, and distribute heat (to a point).

[JustDavid]

Originally Posted by Phalex

1. No solder is solder.

Um, before someone tries plumbing solder, resin core electronic solder is what you want.

[Rattman]

You are capable of doing this job... preparation is your best friend when soldering.

1. Get some electronic soldering flux (it will pay for itself almost immediately)
2. Spend a little extra and get quality "electronics" solder (i.e.) with 3% -4% silver content
3. Wipe clean the tinned soldering tip often on a wet sponge
4. Don't overheat anything.. damage happens very quickly
5. Add solder to your work.. not to the solder tip (unless retinning the tip)
6. Use GREAT lighting and a clean work area
7. Be extremely careful and aware at all times where the hot tip is.. fire hazard!!
8. Do a good clean up.. 90% denatured alcohol removes excess flux well

[detracti]

1. (Think this is answered well already) It is nice to have one of those solder suckers to keep everything tidy. But you can also accomplish this by pulling the solder up onto the iron and then flicking it off with a light tap, against some surface, onto a piece of scrap wood.

2. I'd really suggest springing a little bit for a 25-watt Weller iron. They're not expensive, and well worth it over the long haul. They're much higher quality than enything you'll ever get at Radio Shack.

3. If you're trying to solder to metal tangs or the bottoms of pots, or anything like that, some solder flux can really help to get it to bond, and its fun to watch it heat up and liquify!!!

[sirpug]

I believe this has been mentioned before but I just want to reemphasize it. Make sure the wire is hot enough to "soak up" the solder. A lot of people just use the soldering gun to melt the solder onto the wires (I used to before I was corrected by an old airplane mechanic) and call it good but this is incorrect. The best way I've found is to use some sort of "extra hands" setup (either a buddy to hold the wires in place or I have a stand with a couple of alligator clips to hold everything in place that I use, also available at RS) and lightly place the soldering gun tip on the BACK SIDE (away from you) of the pieces to be soldered. Then you place the solder against the NEAR SIDE of the parts. When the joint is the right temp, the solder will begin to melt into the parts. This is where temperature management becomes critical. You want to just maintain the correct temp but not overheat anything. Remove replace the gun as required until there is sufficient solder in the joint. Then you leave everything in place for about 5 minutes to cool down. Other people may have different processes but this is what works for me. Hope this helps.

PS, also remember to put any shrink wrap or protective sleeves on the wire BEFORE you solder. Again, personal experience speaking.

[msiner]

Hey, I just bought a Radioshack soldering iron today as well. I bought the adjustable 15W/30W one for around $10. I got tired of asking my friend to borrow his. While I was there I got a new jack for my bass and installed that with my new iron when I got home. Good luck with the soldering.

[Jumbotron]

Lots of good advice here.
Here's another one that hopefully you thought of already: wear some eye protection. It's unlikely that it would happen, but if molten solder gets in your eye, it won't be good.

[Joe Nerve]

Thanks everyone. Bought my 11 piece radio shack you can now solder anything kit and am completely ready to dive in. It's got instructions on the back, I've read up a bit on my own, downloaded everything I possibly could from Fender and Dimarzio.... I'm really looking forward to this. Wanted to do it tonight but I'm having UPS issues I just vented about in another post.

Anyhow - I read about eye protection and now you just got me concerned. I've got contact lenses alreday. I guess a pair of reading glasses on top wouldn't hurt. I actually need them anyhow.

Bass goes into the operating froom sometime in the early afternoon tomorrow.

[sirpug]

Just get some safety glasses from Lowes or your local hardware store. They're pretty cheap and they will protect the sides and top. Regular reading glasses don't have the wrap around protection and you would be suprised what will fling up over the top of glasses into your eyes even with the added protection that safety glasses give you.

[lousybassplayer]

I didn't even bother to read what else was posted because if it agrees with this it is solid and I am seconding it, and if it doesn't it is wrong.

Do not heat the solder with the iron tip! Heat the joint itself. Pre heat the joint with the iron until just toucing the solder to the connection will melt it. If you melt the solder over a cold joint, it is acting as a glue, but all you are getting electronically is the wire touching the whatever you are soldering it to. This is my best peice of advice. Melting the solder bytouching it directly to the iron tip is going to yeild the same result as just cold splicing wire to whatever you are soldering.

Ok, after that rant I see that other people have in fact mentioned it. Good. I also advise a solder removal tool, a spring oladed syringe/plunger type tool that sucks up melted solder. They are inexpensve and are handy, since the old solder mightas well be removed.

[msiner]

Originally Posted by Joe Nerve

Anyhow - I read about eye protection and now you just got me concerned. I've got contact lenses alreday. I guess a pair of reading glasses on top wouldn't hurt. I actually need them anyhow.

My friend who taught me how to solder said that the smoke from solder really irritates his eyes when he is wearing contacts. Just something to keep in mind.

[Joe Nerve]

Mission accomplished!

Didn't time it but I think it took about an hour and a half - maybe 2. I took my time and had to pause to give myself a pep talk several times along the way.

I took a good deal of the suggestions here, but had go my own way a couple of times, and probably did a coupla no-nos - but it all works, feels pretty solid, and the way all the wires are jammed in the cavity now I doubt anything is going to rattle loose.

The main problems I encountered were first that no matter how much I heated where the wire joined the pots, for some reason it wasn't coming loose. I was starting to melt wires around the connection so I gave up and went at it with a wire clippers. Snipped it right at he connection and all was swell. Only other difficulty was figuring out I had to remove the pan pot in order to get to where I had to get to - and move a lot of wires...

Anyhow, it's done, it sounds awesome, I'm pretty sure it's a solid job, and I thank you all for helping me along the way.

[bobunit]

Originally Posted by Jumbotron

Lots of good advice here.
Here's another one that hopefully you thought of already: wear some eye protection. It's unlikely that it would happen, but if molten solder gets in your eye, it won't be good.

+1
Something to consider would be proper ventilation. Unless the solder is RoHS compliant, it comprised of tin and lead (60/40 is pretty common). Lead. Good for electronics, bad for you.

[rmars]

Don't buy a RadioShack soldering iron. I just bought one of the 15/30 watt jobs and it barely worked the first time and was shot on the second job. Spend a few more buck and go to Lowe's or Sears and get a Weller 25 watt for about $14-$17.00. I was shocked at the difference in performance and the lack of frustration is worth the few extra bucks. The RadioShack Desoldering braid works pretty slick though and they also stock 63%tin/37%lead solder (p# 64-015) which Rick Turner used to say was optimum.....now where is that receipt for that POS RadioShack soldering iron........

[capnjim]

How come solder isn't spelt sodder?