I really respect how you don't automatically dismiss things just becasue they are chinese. As you say this seems perfectly acceptable and alot better than any of the soldering irons I have ever owned.
There are at least 2 dozen better electronics engineering channels out there, all with the added bonus of not having to endure a squeaky-voiced, hyperactive Aussie presenter. And don't get me started on him refusing to learn how to pronounce the names of the folk who spend a small fucking fortune to send him stuff. He's the McDonalds of TH-cam, many seem to love the crap he serves up. That's fair enough, I'll stick with the folk who provide sustenance.
+TheRaellz Yep. Clive has given me the faith to spend a fair bit on ebay, and the wisdom to *open that shit up* and see if it's worth plugging in. I love deals, but I'm allergic to my apartment going up in flames.
Thanks very much for your review of the generic 936 "digital" and "analog" solder stations. The thermal capacity of these irons is a bit weak due to rather large diametric clearance between the tip and the heating element. This can be dramatically improved by wrapping a bit of aluminum kitchen foil around the heating element. Cut a piece about 30mm wide. Wrap it around the heating element and the tip-support sleeve, leaving a few mm hanging out past the end of the thermocouple. In my case, two turns did the trick. The bit of foil past the thermocouple will crush and fill the space to the tip. The foil improves the thermal conductivity between the heating element, the thermocouple and the tip. Now you can solder to large ground planes repeatedly without waiting for the iron to re-heat. Simple, quick and cheap fix.
Thank you for the aluminium foil advice, it indeed improves performance of iron dramatically. With leaded solder it is hard to tell the difference (even when soldering a ground plane), but with lead-free it is really obvious. Before the foil mod I had to set iron to the 440C in order to use lead-free solder on ground plane, but after wrapping heater with foil, I can set it to 350C and all of a sudden lead-free solder behaves more-less like leaded. I wonder, do they make thermal paste for high temperature applications....
I've had this iron for 6 months. It's bloody stupid good for it's price! I'm still using the same iron so they are very tough and durable. not had to use a spare bit/iron yet. This is my main iron. any other iron from halfords or maplin has failed quickly.
I was as waiting for you to review this, I got pissed off with my three previous irons, the first iron was a 240v 30w, which i had from when i was 16, (40 now), that had a nail as a tip, second was a 240v 60w i got from china that made the power lead floppy and warm, third was a 30w aldi special that had stupid custom screw in tips that break (and leave the threaded part in the shank of the iron, which i destroyed with a screw extractor - one bloke on ebay is optimistically selling theses tips for a fiver each)... anyway, I ordered this iron last week and it came this week (just before your review).I have never felt so spoiled! the iron is light and easy to use, built a couple of power supplies and even salvaged a couple of triacs and heavy parts on alu heatsinks. I feel that you really held back on this review. if you are used to old 240v traditional irons, like drapers or noname brands you will LOVE it. I am a cheap bastard, by my own admission, my three previous irons cost double the cost of this one. But one week in I am just hunting everywhere for things to solder. I didn't switch from coffee to tea, I switched from turd sandwiches to pork and stuffing with a crackling on the side.
John Quinton I'm thinking of getting this station and I'm coming from the same place as you. My crappy 25w Chinese iron broke, I've been using one of those metal tip wood burners for the past few months, and I just got a cheap iron from Lidl to tide me over until I have the money to buy a station.
Many thanks for reviewing cheap Chinese tat over the years. I ordered a Baku 601D station two years ago because of this video during an eBay electronics sale and I've been extremely happy with it. I believe you say here to watch the plug type you buy if you grab extra irons for the station. Of course like a complete prat I ordered the wrong one, but salvaged it by snipping and splicing the cable of the old one to the new iron.
+PuchMaxi1988 Yeah, they are. Even those screw drivers with the tiny 4mm bits he uses...they must come from the same place in China, and the kits are always coming with a different handle. The bits rust just being inside. They're also not very hard. Even spending a little more and buying some name-brand stuff at a hardware store...those bits are crap, too (#2 Phillips bits). This is why I now only buy Wiha screwdrivers. Craftsman is now going to shit as well. It all depends on your own hand-eye skills and how precise the stuff is you're working with, or if you're fabricating things from scratch. Skilled people can make use of good tools. Good tools don't make someone skilled. Unskilled people don't know their ass from their elbow and are the ones who claim there is little difference between cheap and real quality tools.
+Tim Ramich The 9 in 1 screwdriver set from Poundland is one of the best I've ever used. Really hard bits that don't twist or deform. I can tell the difference between good and bad tools and these ones are good. They also sell a set with a rubber handled driver and lots more bits, but that one really is poor quality.
Just bought one of these on the basis of the review and teardown. Interestingly the sellers must be taking notice of the comments about the plugs as mine came with the same moulded plug as Clives but also had a loose rewire- able uk plug in the box! So will be snipping off the supplied plug and adding in the alternative one (and ditching the 13amp fuse at the same time!) Keep up the good work Big Clive!
I'm always amazed at how you can hold the soldering iron, solder, and board together. It's almost like you have three hands. I imagine that comes with years of practice.
Bending leads - oh man you struck nostalgic gold. My electronics professor insisted that our tools include a tool that looked like a diddle stick with a pointy probe at one end and a split end on the other. You put the lead in the split and give the tool a twist. It gives you a bend with no stress on the part, and gives you freedom to bend leads where you think they should be. Still have it and never lend it out.
I notice the comment about the plug. I was unaware that plugs could be a problem, even counterfeit. Could you do a video about dodgy plugs and fuses please? I find your videos and ways of explaining are very helpful.
I bought a generic soldering station from maplins for £50. absolutely fantastic. can't believe I been using cheap irons for so long. my soldering is boss now
Excellent and down to earth review. For the "elitists" (typically those who just spent their entire savings on a top of the line brand-name unit); spend a moment on thinking about "in what countries are the most professional manual solderjoints being made each day", next ponder if they would use a "high end" imported one or a locally manufactured "this is what makes you reach your daily quota with quality" type of device, now compare. "Professional" takes on a whole meaning
TH-cam as great as is, a huge magnet attracting the e-peen dick-waving and overly egoistical crowd of all flavors. For real pro work, the price is a moot point anyway since the chances are the employer will be paying and providing the expensive toys. Now comes the scary part about China manufacturing: They are already more than capable in making a soldering station that wipe the original Hakko off the face of the earth at the same price point, but they choose to make stuff at 10% of the cost for 80% of quality due to much higher demand. The smart people living outside China are deathly scared of China for good reason, the dumb ones are the still happily chanting the "China only make sucky products" memes when these fools don't even have the capability to make a lousy clone if their lives depended on it.
For the "hobbyist without bottomless pockets" these Hakko clones are perfectly OK, AND spare parts are readily available (handpieces, elements, bits (obviously)) for very reasonable prices. I'm using an 888D copy - and the bits alone are so numerous (and reasonably priced) that it was well worth migrating from my old non-thermostatic Antex. If the control unit dies, I'll simply buy another.
The company I work for had to replace a lot of older soldering stations because the people in product development designed a circuit board based on what their fancy soldering stations could easily do and neglected to check if the daily drivers down in production were up to the task. Turns out modern, digital soldering station that provide 80 Watts and respond to drops in temperature within fractions of a second can deal with much higher thermal masses than analogue soldering stations that provide 30 Watts and take several seconds to realize that the tip cooled down... The time it took the pad for the ground to get from the flux' working temperature to the solder's working temperature was so long the pad was oxidized again. The work-around we used until we got soldering stations with sufficient power was to take a huge blob of solder onto the tip, heat up the joint at full power (according to the dial that would have been 400°C, but I doubt that's what a thermometer would have shown) for fifteen to twenty seconds and then use a squeeze bottle with a very fine, metal dosing nozzle to bring in the flux. To anyone who is ever tempted to try this: The use safety goggles is highly recommended, due to the amount of sizzling you get from pouring liquid flux onto a hot soldering joint. But boy was I glad when the soldering station that forced me to go through that effort was replaced with the same type the people in product development used.
A word of caution IIRC, the temperature overshoots by a long way, but the display is sneakily limited in software to never display a temperature higher than the set temperature, so you do have to leave it a good while to come down from the overshoot between turning on and using it.
I got nearly the same Model from a UK supplier on E-Bay. Compared to my Weller WHS40D (which has a screw to hold the tip in) it is actually better. I changed the UK Plug to a German Type F Plug and tested it: It is amazing. I can't wait to solder my next projects. Totally recommend it.
I agree completely about the "feel" or irons. I've always used Antex for my home irons, except for an old Solon I inherited. At work they had Wellers, a real pain used to take a time to adjust each time I changed over.
I was too amazed that it worked that well at getting the temperature that close to what you set it to after the calibration. Good bit of kit and great video, keep them coming Clive :)
Clive, I know this is an older vid so you might not see this, but thanks to you I got a soldering station for myself, a Katsu branded one with a hot air gun too. One thing I like about it, is if it notices that the thermocouple isn't temperature cycling over a certain amount of time, the unit goes into a 'sleep' mode where it keeps the temperature at about 200C until you pick up the iron again and it starts thermal cycling, just so you don't burn out tips if you happen to do something that takes a bit longer, but can jump straight back in (it heats back up to the set temperature again very quickly). Does this unit do that? I'm thinking of getting a 936D style one just because the new irons for it are dirt cheap. The ones for my Katsu are the opposite gender and have 6 pins, not 5, so they're a bit rarer and more expensive, but functionally the same.
Have to say I agree that cheap doesn't always mean rubbish. I've just had to get rid of an orbital sander, I bought twenty years ago. It was Woolworths' own. Finally gave up the magic smoke, having been using it daily for three months. On the other hand I was asked to check out an expensive oscilloscope in a local lab. The soldering, including hand soldered joints was the worst I've ever seen in.
Hi, I purchased a similar unit, based on your video review. It's a YiHUA 937+ (Yah Hooo!!!) not the same brand or model, as yours. It came with the solid white heating element, not the flexible one. The iron cord is a little short (32"), but it's silicone and very flexible. It holds temp very well. The LED goes out if you turn the temp down, then the display switches to actual temp, until the irons cools to the set temp, the LED flashes quickly if maintaining temp and slowly if you set to higher temp and it is heating up. I opened it up (as one does), and checked the internal construction and wiring. There is good continuity from the ground prong on the power cord to the tip of the iron, the Load and Neutral are isolated from the ground. It came with a Certificate Card inspected by 2, and an impressive Authenticity sticker on the back (with a SCRATCH area, I am tempted to scratch, itches us, it does). It's not as colorful as yours (basic black), but at $35.09 delivered from New Jersey, I'll take it. Keep up the good work...
Hi Clive, My favourite iron is an old Draper. Not the type where the bits slide over, nor do they screw in. They slide in and are then held by a screw that's part of the iron. The GREAT thing is that I make my own chisel bits using the solid copper core of Westflex W103 coaxial cable. This is a 50 ohm cable beloved of many radio amateur operators. It is truly perfect!
+Le Plum i too make my own copper bits, i mostly use a 12v 40w iron. i dont have an issue tinning just the first 3-4 mm of a tip and letting the rest tarnish so it doesnt wick solder up its entire length, they work just fine, and you can just file and reshape if you have to, but keeping clean in a pan scrubber in a small tin (better than the sponge) is all i do
Keep coming back to this, actually bought this iron on the back of watching this video back in the day. Good buy, I think I paid under £20 for it back in 2017.
Really enjoying all the video's, so much information. Just getting into some basic electronics and bought one of these station on ebay, it's arrived today with a fully fitted compliant 3 pin plug with a 3amp fuse installed. Now I've got something to practice my soldering with.
to your comment about "when they try and make the electronics too fancy...." it made me think of Doctor Who's line "the more advanced the technology, the more vulnerable it is to primitive attack. People often overlook the simple things." ((4th Doctor "The Pirate Planet")) -- while he was referring to a sci-fi lock that he picked with a bobby pin, it is applicable many places, where when you go too far with putting bells and whistles on something, the easier it is to find a way to break it.
For forming leads they have those cheap little red triangular plastic tools with all sorts of lead spacings, you just center the component and bend them to get really nice looking bends, though most of the time I just do it by hand too. Would be handy if you were doing a lot of components though.
Hi Clive. I just got the black version of the 936D. Its different, mine has a callibration trimpot through the front panel, like the analogue ones. It does make some noise when the iron is heating which isnt brill. The stand is exactly the same as this one. Overall its a good tool, warm up is super quick, like you point out on bigger terms it does cool down, but I find it a lot nimbler and better to use than my xytronic.
Love your videos, Clive. One small request: when you discuss products you got on eBay (at least, good ones!) could you link them in the description? I know the comments for this video have found a couple of examples, and you linked the Hakko 191 yourself (which I've just bought). It'd just be handy to have that info up front so we have a better chance of getting the same model and hopefully batch as you did, that we now know is a good example. Thanks again for the great videos! Learning a lot.
I have Yihua temperature-controlled soldering iron, which had a fault which made it run at 100% power all the time, reaching 450°C regardless of the setting. The LED for the "power" was on all the time while it should dim when I set it to lower temperatures. I took it apart and found absolutely no problems with the components. I reassembled it, and now it works great. I'm not sure how and why it was stuck at 100% power.
Just ordered one of these after my cheapy 30W mains iron gave up and some of your favourite tips to try from Sellerbible. Really looking forward to trying it out, thanks for showing it and pointing me in the right direction.
In daily use I much prefer the analog control knob stations (with all other things equal). It's just so much quicker to nudge the temperature up for soldering magnet wire, or nudge it down to make bridges on breadboard.
Interesting! Finally a soldering iron that would work nicely for simple repair work on simple circuits and at a price that a non proffessional could afford and get decent results out of.
I bought one of the analog ones with the dial on the front for 20$ shipped and it's actually really, really decent. Only downside is the iron might actually float off if it's not attached to the base unit; it's got so little thermal mass! This hasn't been a problem for my Arduino level tinkering though!
Tightness or otherwise of earth screw may be academic when they have a shrouded earth pin on the plug, so it may not make contact with the earth in the socket! And I bet the cores in that mains lead are crappy CCA
+mikeselectricstuff Yeah, I didn't spot that. Mainly because I didn't even expect it. Off with the plug Flame test on the cores... It's CCA. But at least they had used a random brand of 13A fuse to make sure that any faults are loud. I'll add some notes.
There's nothing wrong with the earth plug. At 1:12 in you can plainly see the earth pin. It shows up as a nice shiny British type Pin that's half shrouded as it should be. So have i missed something??
I used to rewrite manuals for colleagues. Many, even ones that were originally written in English, are confusing to say the least. One piece of lab equipment I did this for had a manual that was over 1/2" thick. What I did was start without the manual, find out how to make it dow what was needed and write a new manual of 4 sides of A4!
One feature I would welcome on these units is a 1 hour timer, so that if (when) I forget to switch the unit OFF, it does just that all by itself after one hour. Because if you leave an iron ON for 24 hours or so, you may well find it burned out when you return... It happened to me... The timer might have an annonciator (beep) after 50 minutes so that you may retrigger the unit manually for an extra hour by the push of a button...
I bought the 936D+, made by Zeny, and found that there was no ground wire between the circuit board and the mains ground. The iron tip itself had a ground wire that connected to the circuit board but the lead was a dead end. I had to install a ground wire myself in order to make the tip grounded to the mains. I filed a complaint with the seller, and they insisted that there was nothing wrong with the soldering iron as it was. They even sent me a European CE certification document, which I suspect was a fake because it seems like a unit like that would have to be properly grounded in order to pass certification requirements.
I watch these old videos and get all excited about upgrading my gear to your old video stuff, then I look and using the exact numbers I come up with 154 bucks for the unit. Then I found that modifying my search to Soldering iron station and I find the cheap ones at around 40 bucks or less. I am just swearing off my purchasing binge blowing some money from mom's house sale as I need to by some new teeth, funny how they all began falling out when my wife got cancer and within 3 months she had passed away and nearly all my upper teeth broke off at the gum line. Not sure how that works but now I am trying to eat with only 6 teeth on top, the bottoms are nearly all intact though for some reason or another.
Hey Big Clive, thanks for an excellent channel. You have deep knowledge but are not afraid to do ghost detectors or violet wands. Regarding soldering stations - I'm an old geezer in the US and I can't quit my Weller. Thanks so much! Cheers...
I got a Gaoyue 936+ awhile back... Was a 120v model, which is nice as well. Honestly can't complain about it for $25. This one just blinks an LED when it reaches the ~temp. Came with real Gootwick, a stand, sponge, some solder, 6 tips, flux, an iron, and (obviously) the station... Hasn't broke yet. Of course I tossed the flux and sponge... Used my own
I bought a W.E.R 952D ,whoever they are, soldering and hot air rework station with spare elements for each for sixty quid and so far so good. I have not had a butcher's inside yet but it's in a nice solid metal case with dual cool blue digital readouts and air speed controller with different nozzles for the hot air. Looks like the same generic iron as yours, so all good I hope. EBay jobbie in less than a week.
Oh I searched for the 936D on aliexpress and was greeted by a digital soldering iron with the temperature control integrated into the handle, with no "station" part, just direct plug. Searching for the 937 (as stated on the box) returns a black soldering station, similar in design presumably but with 3 buttons (the third button to directly enter the calibration mode I presume).
I bought a Hakko 936D soldering station in 2012 - black rather than multi-colour case. At that time the heat gun was not yet a common or inexpensive option. (I should have waited a year). I'd used a Weller soldering station for 20+ years, and it was still working, and I can't recall what prompted me to buy the Hakko - possibly a gift certificate or 50% off coupon. Of late I've been wondering if retrofitting the Hakko to add on the hot air gun is possible, or desirable. Once upon a time I'd just have ordered a newer unit, but a small fixed income and "want" not "need" has made me wonder if there's a way to modify the existing box for a hot air handpiece. I suspect not, and that I'll have to wait for a minor windfall or other unlikely event. The Hakko has given very good service, and a selection of tips and elements are available at reasonable prices. Weller tips have become very pricey, although they are still high quality. Like you, I use a soldering station less than I once did, but I've no complaint about the quality or longevity of the Hakko.
bob smith but then he wouldn’t be live, he’d just be big Clive, and his videos are filmed live so it has to be big something live so the only option is big c live
I have the Kaleep 8586 dual hot air/soldering station and a questionably cased LC200A LC meter of the wonderful "Chinese cheap fantastical" range. Both are greatly accurate and very reliable items and do their jobs splendidly . Some stuff I agree can be totally naff and only last 2 weeks or so like a supa-doopa usb thin steel microscope with stand thing I bought that apparently had rave reviews all over the net. Nice to see you give a straight forward view on these items instead of some peeps on here nit picking and slagging the hell out of them at every given opportunity all because they love their top notch shiny branded stuff better. :-)
I've bought a roll of red Lee filter just for things like this. A red filter in front of these LED displays dramatically increases readabilty when operated in well lit surroundings.
I must say I'm impressed by the build of these irons (from somebody who is a religious watcher of your dangerous eBay gadget videos) though if I had one of these cheap irons, I would spend the time to get it somewhere close to calibration
I'm a PLC programmer and I am doing a project now to switch from a Omron PLC to a Siemens. I also did a pasta plant going from Siemens to Allen Bradley. It's not as hard as you think switching PLCs. I imagine when there is no hardware effort, it's even easier.
I'm noticing a lot of the "936D" models on sale have the digital display, but the temperature selection and calibration controls are still analogue knobs.
great machine none of my papers blow away with this on top..was going to use it as a soldering then realised the heat setting goes from 140C to 400 and back down again ,,fully automatic.
Love the way you can hold a pcb and solder in one hand and still hit the spot while holding the iron in the other hand. Guess its years of practice, or maybe years of playing the piano :-) I need the pcb on the bench or clamped down.
I ordered one of these after your last 936 video. Glad I went for the digital version - it was cheaper to!. My previous iron is getting harder and harder to find tips for and they end up costing almost half the price of this whole unit. I'll be sure to open mine before use and check the earth - might need to change the plug too - was that a shielded earth pin? Thanks for the review.
+Adam Welch How was it cheaper? I've found Hakko clones for as low as $25, I don't think anyone even makes a soldering station any cheaper than that. (aside from those power controlled irons)
+Adam Welch DERP! I didn't even notice that. Mainly because I don't normally expect to see a sleeved earth pin. That's coming off! I'll just add a note about that.
+vgamesx1 I found that the none digital version was retailing on eBay for about £30-35 and the 936D shown in this video was going for £24-28. Things might have been different I guess if I'd looked on eBay.com and paid the PayPal exchange charges.
***** That's odd, the one I found was shipped locally at $25 (£17.5) and I don't remember what the cheapest digital one was but they were about the same price $36 (£24). Not bad though. I just thought I'd have a quick look and they're actually selling em even cheaper now, Wow. r.ebay.com/LEUIUK
+vgamesx1 There does seem to be a difference in price between 110v and 220/230v versions. We seem to be paying a premium over here. Is there more windings in a 230 transformer? Can't see any other reason why that would be. Anyway - best value for me was this digital version. Should be here early next week.
I've been meaning to get a new iron for a while now, but got delayed due to a bit of an argument with my current iron. went to take it from the bench after being left for several days. grabbed it by the barrel to find that it was still plugged in! luckily only third degree burns across the left palm and left some nasty blisters. Lessons learned, check your irons are unplugged and don't grab it by the barrel! anyway, I digress. I think I'll pick one of these up, for the money it looks good enough!
I bought quite a few of these for work and private use. Some have completely horrible internal design with 2 pcb boards and loads of wires going all over the place. The single pcb board design, like the one shown here, is much better and has never caused any problems for me. I'm not sure about the anti-static claims they make. The iron itself is quite crappy, but good enough for basic hobby work. The sleeve at the wire end tends to separate from the iron.
I have the Circuit Specialist version of that iron. It has three temperature memories but otherwise the same thing. I use it in production in my cable making business soldering audio and DIN connectors and it keeps up with no trouble.
Just a thought... minor point here; but were it mine I'd cobble up pound or two of 'ballast' for that iron holder to keep it from sliding around in the heat of battle.
yeah, I'd second this, the partially sleeved pin was present on my unit that arrived a few days ago, typical fake Chinese BS plug. disappointed it wasn't noticed. otherwise the unit is great though, checked the internal earth screw on the back of this video and mine was nice and tight, perhaps quality control slightly lacking.
+w0mbles I am not from the UK but from Germany instead, I am not familiar with UK sockets, but it might be that the contacts for the earth in the socket is fairly near to the socket surface, so perhaps it does not make contact if the ground pin is sleeved.
***** exactly this, the sleeving can break the continuity. These cheap plugs also have a poor chrome plating that flakes off and causes high resistance both on the earth and the live pins.
Congrats on the 100k !!!!!!!!! If you put bolts through the holes of the stand, with the thread sticking up, you can stick your tips on them nicely. Also it would help to screw the stand to a larger baseplate to make it more solid. I'm glad you are happy with this piece of crap, and I'm doubly glad I don't have to.
I like how most Chinese Soldering Irons are the same. I have one with a faulty transformer, and one with a faulty display, I combined them into one working.
Hey that is not a bad soldering iron at all! Except for the plug of course, but hey -part of the adventure and unfortunately par for the course. Great Stuff Clive
I've noticed that The 8-Bit Guy and Dave Jones prefer to solder with the iron at a lower temperature, while Big Clive and Mr. Carlson prefer the iron at a higher temperature. Considering the known climates of these video bloggers (Texas and NSW vs. Manx and BC), I wonder if there's an inverse correlation between ambient temperature and preferred iron temperature.
Hi Clive, I enjoy your videos very much. After watching this video I bought one of these soldering stations and also the temperature tester you show. My iron is wildly out on correct temperature by about 57 deg C but the adjustment only allows a 50 deg C. Is there an internal adjustment as well? Keep up the good work. Paul
57 degrees is nothing, mine measured 180 degrees too high! Was set to 400C and melted the plastic nut that holds the metal shaft to the plastic part of the handle, so now it's just flapping in the breeze. Got the hakko 191 the day after and the tip measures 580C when set to 400...Must have been something wrong with the thermocouple. Luckily new handles are cheap as chips so I ordered a couple of new ones, only wish the shipping from China didn't take so long. Curious to see when the new ones arrive if the fact that they are 50W and the one that came with the station was 60W will make a difference. Think I'll try measuring the resistance of the heating element of both to see if there actually is any difference.
+bigclivedotcom Thanks for another great video. Though I have a couple of possibly stupid questions, what does "sleeved earthplug" mean, and why is it that are they bad And also, possibly an even more stupid question, why do You reckon it says "lead-free soldering station" on "station" and the manual ?? Best regards
+Mats Rdr The earth pins are supposed to be solid metal. (preferably brass) and the addition of the plastic section could mean that it defeats the main earth connection point on the pin. "Lead-free soldering station" is a gimmick. Like "digital ready".
OK, many thanks for the answers. [[Actually when I first saw a "sleeved ground pin" I thought it was some kind of " new safety measure". ((ironic I know)) Any way my point being that I wouldn't be surprised if most people are not aware that "sleeved earth plugs" are "not up to snuff" and should be avoided.]] Best regards.
Clive, I have the digital 3-in-1 station, which is a hot air gun, soldering iron and (quite possibly the worst) bench power supply all in one unit. Maybe I should do a teardown of mine... Anyway, I have the same exact stand, and if you go to the hardware store and get some small machine screws and nuts, you can put them in the holes for the stand pointing upwards. This allows you to put the bits on the stand, and the tip faces upwards so you can see which one it is. After doing this, the stand is GREAT.
Hi Clive, How are you getting on with your 936D ? After many hundreds of hours of use my WLX-936D iron has finally given up the ghost. Simply failed to power up one morning. There is power to the microcontroller but no output (and no display) so it appears that the controller IC has died. Can't complain as it was used on a helluva lot of projects & did very well for a relatively cheap iron. Now sat in 'To Do' pile until I pick up an analogue version of control board. If I bump into one I will buy another xxx-936D as the easy temperature adjustment and stability was very handy for SMD projects, repairs, prototyping & small batch builds with temperature sensitive components. :-) Have worn out two other irons over the same time period that were almost twice the price (and not as nice to use due to fiddly temperature calibration) Only temp controlled Iron that has outlived the 936D is a big old Weller that has lasted over 20 years! (way too chunky & clumsy for modern SMD components tho..)
Excellent, good to see that this one gets a thumbs up. I noticed it has 'lead-free' on the unit and the manual, is that actually going to make any difference or is it the usual way of slapping things on to make it seem more advanced than it is?
Just ordered one of these, and has arrived just now..... there are some cheaper ones with the manual POT temp adjustment for calibration, but prefer the digital method. got a few spare so called Hakko branded tips (Doubt there are genuine, but hey, if they work, I am not bothered). You are right about the mains plug..... dam earth pin is sleeved, so that will be replaced later. One quite amusing thing I have found is the brand name; Katsu..... same name as used as a Japanese style curry :D
7:35 - I thought the same thing on mine. The rack you have is identical to the one that came with my Chinese-y Hot air/soldering station. They both also seem to be mimicking the Hakko stations with the blue/yellow color scheme. I rather like the station for what it is but Can't figure out what those holes are for!!
About those IC-sockets. I prefer to use the flat ones because you can easily turn them into surface-mountable socets for normal ICs. Also im interested about your opinion on SMD vs. Through hole components, i personally love smd because its easy to make PCBs for them at home and soldering them is often easier.
Hey Clive, great vid as allways. Until now, I am working just with trafo gun iron, but I am thinking of trying some soldering station. Those chinese ones you shown us looks fine, but I am not sure, how to calibrate 'em, since that 191 thermometer costs same price like station with equipment or even more. My question, is it possible to check it with standard thermo couple delivered with multimeter? I am not sure, what is the range of that unit (unfortunately, I get rid of all packing material also with all datasheets). Or any other way how to calibrate it? Or just try it, how it feels during soldering?
My Yihua soldering station arrived with a '5 Amp' fuse in the plug. I took the fuse apart and it had more like the old 15amp fuse wire inside. I would definitely replace the fuse, if not the entire plug with a proper BS one. The wire measured about 0.4mm.
Still love my odd Californian " Met Cal".. Ive gone through a few irons in my time including Maplin's crappy "precision gold" . But the Metcal is soo amazing.
![BOWKYLION - วิงวอน (ex-change) [Official MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/cLdnZWDaO-w/mqdefault.jpg)
I really respect how you don't automatically dismiss things just becasue they are chinese. As you say this seems perfectly acceptable and alot better than any of the soldering irons I have ever owned.
+rimmersbryggeri : Just one of the many reasons why this bloke pisses all over EEV channel.
There are at least 2 dozen better electronics engineering channels out there, all with the added bonus of not having to endure a squeaky-voiced, hyperactive Aussie presenter. And don't get me started on him refusing to learn how to pronounce the names of the folk who spend a small fucking fortune to send him stuff. He's the McDonalds of TH-cam, many seem to love the crap he serves up. That's fair enough, I'll stick with the folk who provide sustenance.
+InnaSoulSounds not knowing how to pronounce every word in every language is the worst thing you can think of? wow.
+TheRaellz Yep. Clive has given me the faith to spend a fair bit on ebay, and the wisdom to *open that shit up* and see if it's worth plugging in.
I love deals, but I'm allergic to my apartment going up in flames.
+PULL MY Finger He's extra-nasal. I happen to like his content, but I can't watch him for hours like I can with other Aussie channels.
Thanks very much for your review of the generic 936 "digital" and "analog" solder stations. The thermal capacity of these irons is a bit weak due to rather large diametric clearance between the tip and the heating element. This can be dramatically improved by wrapping a bit of aluminum kitchen foil around the heating element. Cut a piece about 30mm wide. Wrap it around the heating element and the tip-support sleeve, leaving a few mm hanging out past the end of the thermocouple. In my case, two turns did the trick. The bit of foil past the thermocouple will crush and fill the space to the tip. The foil improves the thermal conductivity between the heating element, the thermocouple and the tip. Now you can solder to large ground planes repeatedly without waiting for the iron to re-heat. Simple, quick and cheap fix.
Thank you for the aluminium foil advice, it indeed improves performance of iron dramatically.
With leaded solder it is hard to tell the difference (even when soldering a ground plane), but with lead-free it is really obvious. Before the foil mod I had to set iron to the 440C in order to use lead-free solder on ground plane, but after wrapping heater with foil, I can set it to 350C and all of a sudden lead-free solder behaves more-less like leaded.
I wonder, do they make thermal paste for high temperature applications....
nice trick..
I've had this iron for 6 months. It's bloody stupid good for it's price! I'm still using the same iron so they are very tough and durable. not had to use a spare bit/iron yet. This is my main iron. any other iron from halfords or maplin has failed quickly.
I was as waiting for you to review this, I got pissed off with my three previous irons, the first iron was a 240v 30w, which i had from when i was 16, (40 now), that had a nail as a tip, second was a 240v 60w i got from china that made the power lead floppy and warm, third was a 30w aldi special that had stupid custom screw in tips that break (and leave the threaded part in the shank of the iron, which i destroyed with a screw extractor - one bloke on ebay is optimistically selling theses tips for a fiver each)... anyway, I ordered this iron last week and it came this week (just before your review).I have never felt so spoiled! the iron is light and easy to use, built a couple of power supplies and even salvaged a couple of triacs and heavy parts on alu heatsinks. I feel that you really held back on this review. if you are used to old 240v traditional irons, like drapers or noname brands you will LOVE it. I am a cheap bastard, by my own admission, my three previous irons cost double the cost of this one. But one week in I am just hunting everywhere for things to solder. I didn't switch from coffee to tea, I switched from turd sandwiches to pork and stuffing with a crackling on the side.
John Quinton I'm thinking of getting this station and I'm coming from the same place as you. My crappy 25w Chinese iron broke, I've been using one of those metal tip wood burners for the past few months, and I just got a cheap iron from Lidl to tide me over until I have the money to buy a station.
Many thanks for reviewing cheap Chinese tat over the years. I ordered a Baku 601D station two years ago because of this video during an eBay electronics sale and I've been extremely happy with it.
I believe you say here to watch the plug type you buy if you grab extra irons for the station. Of course like a complete prat I ordered the wrong one, but salvaged it by snipping and splicing the cable of the old one to the new iron.
That's what I like about Clive, he doesn't have pretensions!
+PuchMaxi1988 It's not pretentious to refuse to use cheap tools.
+Tim Ramich That's right, but not all cheap tools are necessarily bad.
+PuchMaxi1988 Yeah, they are. Even those screw drivers with the tiny 4mm bits he uses...they must come from the same place in China, and the kits are always coming with a different handle. The bits rust just being inside. They're also not very hard. Even spending a little more and buying some name-brand stuff at a hardware store...those bits are crap, too (#2 Phillips bits). This is why I now only buy Wiha screwdrivers. Craftsman is now going to shit as well. It all depends on your own hand-eye skills and how precise the stuff is you're working with, or if you're fabricating things from scratch. Skilled people can make use of good tools. Good tools don't make someone skilled. Unskilled people don't know their ass from their elbow and are the ones who claim there is little difference between cheap and real quality tools.
+Tim Ramich The 9 in 1 screwdriver set from Poundland is one of the best I've ever used. Really hard bits that don't twist or deform. I can tell the difference between good and bad tools and these ones are good. They also sell a set with a rubber handled driver and lots more bits, but that one really is poor quality.
Can you give us a link for this 936D Soldering Station US Version? Thanks
Just bought one of these on the basis of the review and teardown. Interestingly the sellers must be taking notice of the comments about the plugs as mine came with the same moulded plug as Clives but also had a loose rewire- able uk plug in the box! So will be snipping off the supplied plug and adding in the alternative one (and ditching the 13amp fuse at the same time!) Keep up the good work Big Clive!
I'm always amazed at how you can hold the soldering iron, solder, and board together. It's almost like you have three hands. I imagine that comes with years of practice.
it takes practice and years and years of expereience.
@@petrosrz Practice and years of experience, or a few weeks on an assembly line.
Bending leads - oh man you struck nostalgic gold. My electronics professor insisted that our tools include a tool that looked like a diddle stick with a pointy probe at one end and a split end on the other. You put the lead in the split and give the tool a twist. It gives you a bend with no stress on the part, and gives you freedom to bend leads where you think they should be. Still have it and never lend it out.
Thank you, I got a Weller hobby iron and a stick like that Was included. Now I know what it is for.
I notice the comment about the plug. I was unaware that plugs could be a problem, even counterfeit. Could you do a video about dodgy plugs and fuses please? I find your videos and ways of explaining are very helpful.
Fake plugs are a plague. Fake fuses are everywhere as well but harder to spot.
Thats why I like the fact that most countries have the fuses in (or outside) the case ;)
I bought a generic soldering station from maplins for £50. absolutely fantastic. can't believe I been using cheap irons for so long. my soldering is boss now
Excellent and down to earth review.
For the "elitists" (typically those who just spent their entire savings on a top of the line brand-name unit); spend a moment on thinking about "in what countries are the most professional manual solderjoints being made each day", next ponder if they would use a "high end" imported one or a locally manufactured "this is what makes you reach your daily quota with quality" type of device, now compare. "Professional" takes on a whole meaning
TH-cam as great as is, a huge magnet attracting the e-peen dick-waving and overly egoistical crowd of all flavors. For real pro work, the price is a moot point anyway since the chances are the employer will be paying and providing the expensive toys.
Now comes the scary part about China manufacturing: They are already more than capable in making a soldering station that wipe the original Hakko off the face of the earth at the same price point, but they choose to make stuff at 10% of the cost for 80% of quality due to much higher demand. The smart people living outside China are deathly scared of China for good reason, the dumb ones are the still happily chanting the "China only make sucky products" memes when these fools don't even have the capability to make a lousy clone if their lives depended on it.
For the "hobbyist without bottomless pockets" these Hakko clones are perfectly OK, AND spare parts are readily available (handpieces, elements, bits (obviously)) for very reasonable prices. I'm using an 888D copy - and the bits alone are so numerous (and reasonably priced) that it was well worth migrating from my old non-thermostatic Antex. If the control unit dies, I'll simply buy another.
Phil S It's the spares that really attract me, well that and the low price.
The company I work for had to replace a lot of older soldering stations because the people in product development designed a circuit board based on what their fancy soldering stations could easily do and neglected to check if the daily drivers down in production were up to the task. Turns out modern, digital soldering station that provide 80 Watts and respond to drops in temperature within fractions of a second can deal with much higher thermal masses than analogue soldering stations that provide 30 Watts and take several seconds to realize that the tip cooled down...
The time it took the pad for the ground to get from the flux' working temperature to the solder's working temperature was so long the pad was oxidized again. The work-around we used until we got soldering stations with sufficient power was to take a huge blob of solder onto the tip, heat up the joint at full power (according to the dial that would have been 400°C, but I doubt that's what a thermometer would have shown) for fifteen to twenty seconds and then use a squeeze bottle with a very fine, metal dosing nozzle to bring in the flux. To anyone who is ever tempted to try this: The use safety goggles is highly recommended, due to the amount of sizzling you get from pouring liquid flux onto a hot soldering joint. But boy was I glad when the soldering station that forced me to go through that effort was replaced with the same type the people in product development used.
A word of caution
IIRC, the temperature overshoots by a long way, but the display is sneakily limited in software to never display a temperature higher than the set temperature, so you do have to leave it a good while to come down from the overshoot between turning on and using it.
I got nearly the same Model from a UK supplier on E-Bay. Compared to my Weller WHS40D (which has a screw to hold the tip in) it is actually better.
I changed the UK Plug to a German Type F Plug and tested it: It is amazing. I can't wait to solder my next projects. Totally recommend it.
I agree completely about the "feel" or irons. I've always used Antex for my home irons, except for an old Solon I inherited. At work they had Wellers, a real pain used to take a time to adjust each time I changed over.
I was too amazed that it worked that well at getting the temperature that close to what you set it to after the calibration. Good bit of kit and great video, keep them coming Clive :)
Clive, I know this is an older vid so you might not see this, but thanks to you I got a soldering station for myself, a Katsu branded one with a hot air gun too. One thing I like about it, is if it notices that the thermocouple isn't temperature cycling over a certain amount of time, the unit goes into a 'sleep' mode where it keeps the temperature at about 200C until you pick up the iron again and it starts thermal cycling, just so you don't burn out tips if you happen to do something that takes a bit longer, but can jump straight back in (it heats back up to the set temperature again very quickly). Does this unit do that? I'm thinking of getting a 936D style one just because the new irons for it are dirt cheap. The ones for my Katsu are the opposite gender and have 6 pins, not 5, so they're a bit rarer and more expensive, but functionally the same.
Have to say I agree that cheap doesn't always mean rubbish. I've just had to get rid of an orbital sander, I bought twenty years ago. It was Woolworths' own. Finally gave up the magic smoke, having been using it daily for three months. On the other hand I was asked to check out an expensive oscilloscope in a local lab. The soldering, including hand soldered joints was the worst I've ever seen in.
I have a similar unit, a 937D, with 907F iron. Very pleased with it, excellent for my hobby stuff.
Hi, I purchased a similar unit, based on your video review. It's a YiHUA 937+ (Yah Hooo!!!) not the same brand or model, as yours. It came with the solid white heating element, not the flexible one. The iron cord is a little short (32"), but it's silicone and very flexible. It holds temp very well. The LED goes out if you turn the temp down, then the display switches to actual temp, until the irons cools to the set temp, the LED flashes quickly if maintaining temp and slowly if you set to higher temp and it is heating up. I opened it up (as one does), and checked the internal construction and wiring. There is good continuity from the ground prong on the power cord to the tip of the iron, the Load and Neutral are isolated from the ground. It came with a Certificate Card inspected by 2, and an impressive Authenticity sticker on the back (with a SCRATCH area, I am tempted to scratch, itches us, it does). It's not as colorful as yours (basic black), but at $35.09 delivered from New Jersey, I'll take it. Keep up the good work...
Hi Clive, My favourite iron is an old Draper. Not the type where the bits slide over, nor do they screw in. They slide in and are then held by a screw that's part of the iron. The GREAT thing is that I make my own chisel bits using the solid copper core of Westflex W103 coaxial cable. This is a 50 ohm cable beloved of many radio amateur operators. It is truly perfect!
I meant to add that this iron is mains supplied, over 25 years old, has had hundreds, maybe thousands of hours of use and is still totally reliable.
+Le Plum i too make my own copper bits, i mostly use a 12v 40w iron. i dont have an issue tinning just the first 3-4 mm of a tip and letting the rest tarnish so it doesnt wick solder up its entire length, they work just fine, and you can just file and reshape if you have to, but keeping clean in a pan scrubber in a small tin (better than the sponge) is all i do
Keep coming back to this, actually bought this iron on the back of watching this video back in the day. Good buy, I think I paid under £20 for it back in 2017.
Really enjoying all the video's, so much information. Just getting into some basic electronics and bought one of these station on ebay, it's arrived today with a fully fitted compliant 3 pin plug with a 3amp fuse installed. Now I've got something to practice my soldering with.
to your comment about "when they try and make the electronics too fancy...." it made me think of Doctor Who's line "the more advanced the technology, the more vulnerable it is to primitive attack. People often overlook the simple things." ((4th Doctor "The Pirate Planet")) -- while he was referring to a sci-fi lock that he picked with a bobby pin, it is applicable many places, where when you go too far with putting bells and whistles on something, the easier it is to find a way to break it.
For forming leads they have those cheap little red triangular plastic tools with all sorts of lead spacings, you just center the component and bend them to get really nice looking bends, though most of the time I just do it by hand too. Would be handy if you were doing a lot of components though.
Hi Clive.
I just got the black version of the 936D.
Its different, mine has a callibration trimpot through the front panel, like the analogue ones.
It does make some noise when the iron is heating which isnt brill.
The stand is exactly the same as this one.
Overall its a good tool, warm up is super quick, like you point out on bigger terms it does cool down, but I find it a lot nimbler and better to use than my xytronic.
Love your videos, Clive. One small request: when you discuss products you got on eBay (at least, good ones!) could you link them in the description? I know the comments for this video have found a couple of examples, and you linked the Hakko 191 yourself (which I've just bought). It'd just be handy to have that info up front so we have a better chance of getting the same model and hopefully batch as you did, that we now know is a good example. Thanks again for the great videos! Learning a lot.
I have Yihua temperature-controlled soldering iron, which had a fault which made it run at 100% power all the time, reaching 450°C regardless of the setting. The LED for the "power" was on all the time while it should dim when I set it to lower temperatures.
I took it apart and found absolutely no problems with the components.
I reassembled it, and now it works great.
I'm not sure how and why it was stuck at 100% power.
Just ordered one of these after my cheapy 30W mains iron gave up and some of your favourite tips to try from Sellerbible. Really looking forward to trying it out, thanks for showing it and pointing me in the right direction.
I bought one of these to give it a go and threw some genuine tips on it. After calibrating it, it was surprisingly good (for how cheap it was)!
In daily use I much prefer the analog control knob stations (with all other things equal). It's just so much quicker to nudge the temperature up for soldering magnet wire, or nudge it down to make bridges on breadboard.
Interesting! Finally a soldering iron that would work nicely for simple repair work on simple circuits and at a price that a non proffessional could afford and get decent results out of.
I bought one of the analog ones with the dial on the front for 20$ shipped and it's actually really, really decent. Only downside is the iron might actually float off if it's not attached to the base unit; it's got so little thermal mass! This hasn't been a problem for my Arduino level tinkering though!
Tightness or otherwise of earth screw may be academic when they have a shrouded earth pin on the plug, so it may not make contact with the earth in the socket!
And I bet the cores in that mains lead are crappy CCA
+mikeselectricstuff Mike you're such a kill joy.... But so right :)
+Andrew Ballard oxidation.
+mikeselectricstuff Yeah, I didn't spot that. Mainly because I didn't even expect it. Off with the plug Flame test on the cores... It's CCA. But at least they had used a random brand of 13A fuse to make sure that any faults are loud. I'll add some notes.
The KATSU version of this unit seems to come with a proper plug
There's nothing wrong with the earth plug. At 1:12 in you can plainly see the earth pin. It shows up as a nice shiny British type Pin that's half shrouded as it should be. So have i missed something??
Didnt get this but a 936D and im super happy. Thx for teardown Clive, makes it easy to pick out nice stuff for a good buck.
I used to rewrite manuals for colleagues. Many, even ones that were originally written in English, are confusing to say the least. One piece of lab equipment I did this for had a manual that was over 1/2" thick. What I did was start without the manual, find out how to make it dow what was needed and write a new manual of 4 sides of A4!
Nothing screams professional like mis-spelling professional on the box :)
ᗰіɢнѕт ᗩʟʟ ᑕʀᴜᴄᴋіɴɢ ᖴіɢнту hahaha ;)
when i see "alot" in a tutorial, i close tab instantly...but shit like you pointed out actually makes me weirdly happy...not sure why
"made in china" is in lowercase on the box, a sign of great quality.
One feature I would welcome on these units is a 1 hour timer, so that if (when) I forget to switch the unit OFF, it does just that all by itself after one hour. Because if you leave an iron ON for 24 hours or so, you may well find it burned out when you return... It happened to me... The timer might have an annonciator (beep) after 50 minutes so that you may retrigger the unit manually for an extra hour by the push of a button...
I bought the 936D+, made by Zeny, and found that there was no ground wire between the circuit board and the mains ground. The iron tip itself had a ground wire that connected to the circuit board but the lead was a dead end. I had to install a ground wire myself in order to make the tip grounded to the mains. I filed a complaint with the seller, and they insisted that there was nothing wrong with the soldering iron as it was. They even sent me a European CE certification document, which I suspect was a fake because it seems like a unit like that would have to be properly grounded in order to pass certification requirements.
I watch these old videos and get all excited about upgrading my gear to your old video stuff, then I look and using the exact numbers I come up with 154 bucks for the unit. Then I found that modifying my search to Soldering iron station and I find the cheap ones at around 40 bucks or less. I am just swearing off my purchasing binge blowing some money from mom's house sale as I need to by some new teeth, funny how they all began falling out when my wife got cancer and within 3 months she had passed away and nearly all my upper teeth broke off at the gum line. Not sure how that works but now I am trying to eat with only 6 teeth on top, the bottoms are nearly all intact though for some reason or another.
19:20 would be a good argument for requiring certain things to be open source.
The holes in the iron stand/holder accommodate T12 style newer tips perfectly.
Hey Big Clive, thanks for an excellent channel. You have deep knowledge but are not afraid to do ghost detectors or violet wands. Regarding soldering stations - I'm an old geezer in the US and I can't quit my Weller. Thanks so much! Cheers...
I got a Gaoyue 936+ awhile back... Was a 120v model, which is nice as well.
Honestly can't complain about it for $25. This one just blinks an LED when it reaches the ~temp.
Came with real Gootwick, a stand, sponge, some solder, 6 tips, flux, an iron, and (obviously) the station... Hasn't broke yet.
Of course I tossed the flux and sponge... Used my own
Another excellent vid Clive - Thanks! I ordered my one of these yesterday!
I bought a W.E.R 952D ,whoever they are, soldering and hot air rework station with spare elements for each for sixty quid and so far so good. I have not had a butcher's inside yet but it's in a nice solid metal case with dual cool blue digital readouts and air speed controller with different nozzles for the hot air. Looks like the same generic iron as yours, so all good I hope.
EBay jobbie in less than a week.
Oh I searched for the 936D on aliexpress and was greeted by a digital soldering iron with the temperature control integrated into the handle, with no "station" part, just direct plug. Searching for the 937 (as stated on the box) returns a black soldering station, similar in design presumably but with 3 buttons (the third button to directly enter the calibration mode I presume).
I bought a Hakko 936D soldering station in 2012 - black rather than multi-colour case. At that time the heat gun was not yet a common or inexpensive option. (I should have waited a year). I'd used a Weller soldering station for 20+ years, and it was still working, and I can't recall what prompted me to buy the Hakko - possibly a gift certificate or 50% off coupon.
Of late I've been wondering if retrofitting the Hakko to add on the hot air gun is possible, or desirable. Once upon a time I'd just have ordered a newer unit, but a small fixed income and "want" not "need" has made me wonder if there's a way to modify the existing box for a hot air handpiece. I suspect not, and that I'll have to wait for a minor windfall or other unlikely event. The Hakko has given very good service, and a selection of tips and elements are available at reasonable prices. Weller tips have become very pricey, although they are still high quality. Like you, I use a soldering station less than I once did, but I've no complaint about the quality or longevity of the Hakko.
You can get the hot air pen units on their own quite cheaply on eBay.
Hey Clive and how it is now 8 months later?
Who is Clive ? This is Big C’s channel it’s called Big C Live
@@Fee.1 tosser
@@Fee.1 It's Clive. He says his name is Clive on the video titled "Storytime. Glasgow's George Square Christmas lights".
bob smith but then he wouldn’t be live, he’d just be big Clive, and his videos are filmed live so it has to be big something live so the only option is big c live
Ive had mine for about 4 yrs now and its still going strong
I have the Kaleep 8586 dual hot air/soldering station and a questionably cased LC200A LC meter of the wonderful "Chinese cheap fantastical" range. Both are greatly accurate and very reliable items and do their jobs splendidly .
Some stuff I agree can be totally naff and only last 2 weeks or so like a supa-doopa usb thin steel microscope with stand thing I bought that apparently had rave reviews all over the net.
Nice to see you give a straight forward view on these items instead of some peeps on here nit picking and slagging the hell out of them at every given opportunity all because they love their top notch shiny branded stuff better. :-)
Very comprehensive review, thank you for taking the time. But what impressed me the most is your prehensile pinky! :)
You should read the manual. The English is so poor it's a good laugh and totally incomprehensible.
Read thorowghly.
It's the finest Chinglish.
I've bought a roll of red Lee filter just for things like this. A red filter in front of these LED displays dramatically increases readabilty when operated in well lit surroundings.
"Try it without the manual first...always a good option..."
I like how the LED display and your camera are at different frequencies
Clive I have learned so much from you. Most of the time it's your off hand comments that are thoes golden "No shit" moments. Thank you.
I must say I'm impressed by the build of these irons (from somebody who is a religious watcher of your dangerous eBay gadget videos) though if I had one of these cheap irons, I would spend the time to get it somewhere close to calibration
I'm a PLC programmer and I am doing a project now to switch from a Omron PLC to a Siemens. I also did a pasta plant going from Siemens to Allen Bradley. It's not as hard as you think switching PLCs. I imagine when there is no hardware effort, it's even easier.
I wonder if china has a 'ministry of model numbers' - you have to wonder who is coming up with all these arbitrary model numbers!
+blower Hakko, at least in the case of this model number. They want you to find theirs searching for the Hakko.
The model numbers are from the original Japanese Hakko equipment, which these are Chinese copies of.
I'm noticing a lot of the "936D" models on sale have the digital display, but the temperature selection and calibration controls are still analogue knobs.
great machine none of my papers blow away with this on top..was going to use it as a soldering then realised the heat setting goes from 140C to 400 and back down again ,,fully automatic.
18:05 it would also be pretty hard to repair and resolder because your soldering iron is broken
You are very consistent in your video quality an oldy but a goody!
That took 15-20 sec for the display to reach 350ºC, and if that is the feedback from the tip that's pretty good.
Love the way you can hold a pcb and solder in one hand and still hit the spot while holding the iron in the other hand. Guess its years of practice, or maybe years of playing the piano :-) I need the pcb on the bench or clamped down.
have you seen the universal soldering station you can build? It's open source and works with many irons
dangerousprototypes.com/2011/09/02/open-source-universal-soldering-station-controller/
Is that what you're talking about?
Looks like a good iron, puts the machine into a handyman's reach at a good price.
And for component leads, you can get a small thing which has the correct spacing for different number of bird holes, they are only a couple of bucks
I ordered one of these after your last 936 video. Glad I went for the digital version - it was cheaper to!. My previous iron is getting harder and harder to find tips for and they end up costing almost half the price of this whole unit. I'll be sure to open mine before use and check the earth - might need to change the plug too - was that a shielded earth pin? Thanks for the review.
+Adam Welch How was it cheaper? I've found Hakko clones for as low as $25, I don't think anyone even makes a soldering station any cheaper than that. (aside from those power controlled irons)
+Adam Welch DERP! I didn't even notice that. Mainly because I don't normally expect to see a sleeved earth pin. That's coming off! I'll just add a note about that.
+vgamesx1 I found that the none digital version was retailing on eBay for about £30-35 and the 936D shown in this video was going for £24-28. Things might have been different I guess if I'd looked on eBay.com and paid the PayPal exchange charges.
***** That's odd, the one I found was shipped locally at $25 (£17.5) and I don't remember what the cheapest digital one was but they were about the same price $36 (£24).
Not bad though.
I just thought I'd have a quick look and they're actually selling em even cheaper now, Wow.
r.ebay.com/LEUIUK
+vgamesx1 There does seem to be a difference in price between 110v and 220/230v versions. We seem to be paying a premium over here. Is there more windings in a 230 transformer? Can't see any other reason why that would be. Anyway - best value for me was this digital version. Should be here early next week.
If you search for those sockets, search for 'machined pins' or some version thereof; that's typically the term stores use in NA.
I've been meaning to get a new iron for a while now, but got delayed due to a bit of an argument with my current iron. went to take it from the bench after being left for several days. grabbed it by the barrel to find that it was still plugged in! luckily only third degree burns across the left palm and left some nasty blisters. Lessons learned, check your irons are unplugged and don't grab it by the barrel! anyway, I digress. I think I'll pick one of these up, for the money it looks good enough!
I've never picked an iron up by the bit end, but I have had others do it with mine. It's a painful lesson to learn.
I bought quite a few of these for work and private use. Some have completely horrible internal design with 2 pcb boards and loads of wires going all over the place. The single pcb board design, like the one shown here, is much better and has never caused any problems for me. I'm not sure about the anti-static claims they make. The iron itself is quite crappy, but good enough for basic hobby work. The sleeve at the wire end tends to separate from the iron.
I have the Circuit Specialist version of that iron. It has three temperature memories but otherwise the same thing. I use it in production in my cable making business soldering audio and DIN connectors and it keeps up with no trouble.
Just a thought... minor point here; but were it mine I'd cobble up pound or two of 'ballast' for that iron holder to keep it from sliding around in the heat of battle.
Clive did you not realise that the plug has a partially sleeved earth pin...
You can see it at 1:12.
+Jacob Kelly Can you please elaborate on why the partial sleeve is bad?
yeah, I'd second this, the partially sleeved pin was present on my unit that arrived a few days ago, typical fake Chinese BS plug. disappointed it wasn't noticed. otherwise the unit is great though, checked the internal earth screw on the back of this video and mine was nice and tight, perhaps quality control slightly lacking.
+w0mbles I am not from the UK but from Germany instead, I am not familiar with UK sockets, but it might be that the contacts for the earth in the socket is fairly near to the socket surface, so perhaps it does not make contact if the ground pin is sleeved.
***** exactly this, the sleeving can break the continuity. These cheap plugs also have a poor chrome plating that flakes off and causes high resistance both on the earth and the live pins.
***** Cheers.
Congrats on the 100k !!!!!!!!!
If you put bolts through the holes of the stand, with the thread sticking up, you can stick your tips on them nicely. Also it would help to screw the stand to a larger baseplate to make it more solid.
I'm glad you are happy with this piece of crap, and I'm doubly glad I don't have to.
I like how most Chinese Soldering Irons are the same.
I have one with a faulty transformer, and one with a faulty display, I combined them into one working.
It's been said the truest test of a societies advancement is how intuitive their technology is to use.
Hey that is not a bad soldering iron at all!
Except for the plug of course, but hey -part of the adventure and unfortunately par for the course.
Great Stuff Clive
What slipped in to the picture from the lower left at 5:14. That was quite a shock!
I've noticed that The 8-Bit Guy and Dave Jones prefer to solder with the iron at a lower temperature, while Big Clive and Mr. Carlson prefer the iron at a higher temperature. Considering the known climates of these video bloggers (Texas and NSW vs. Manx and BC), I wonder if there's an inverse correlation between ambient temperature and preferred iron temperature.
Hi Clive, I enjoy your videos very much. After watching this video I bought one of these soldering stations and also the temperature tester you show.
My iron is wildly out on correct temperature by about 57 deg C but the adjustment only allows a 50 deg C. Is there an internal adjustment as well?
Keep up the good work.
Paul
I'd suggest just compensating manually by changing the set temperature until the tip is about 330C.
57 degrees is nothing, mine measured 180 degrees too high! Was set to 400C and melted the plastic nut that holds the metal shaft to the plastic part of the handle, so now it's just flapping in the breeze. Got the hakko 191 the day after and the tip measures 580C when set to 400...Must have been something wrong with the thermocouple.
Luckily new handles are cheap as chips so I ordered a couple of new ones, only wish the shipping from China didn't take so long. Curious to see when the new ones arrive if the fact that they are 50W and the one that came with the station was 60W will make a difference. Think I'll try measuring the resistance of the heating element of both to see if there actually is any difference.
+bigclivedotcom
Thanks for another great video.
Though I have a couple of possibly stupid questions, what does "sleeved earthplug" mean, and why is it that are they bad
And also, possibly an even more stupid question, why do You reckon it says "lead-free soldering station" on "station" and the manual ??
Best regards
+Mats Rdr The earth pins are supposed to be solid metal. (preferably brass) and the addition of the plastic section could mean that it defeats the main earth connection point on the pin.
"Lead-free soldering station" is a gimmick. Like "digital ready".
OK, many thanks for the answers.
[[Actually when I first saw a "sleeved ground pin" I thought it was some kind of " new safety measure". ((ironic I know))
Any way my point being that I wouldn't be surprised if most people are not aware that "sleeved earth plugs" are "not up to snuff" and should be avoided.]]
Best regards.
Clive, I have the digital 3-in-1 station, which is a hot air gun, soldering iron and (quite possibly the worst) bench power supply all in one unit. Maybe I should do a teardown of mine... Anyway, I have the same exact stand, and if you go to the hardware store and get some small machine screws and nuts, you can put them in the holes for the stand pointing upwards. This allows you to put the bits on the stand, and the tip faces upwards so you can see which one it is. After doing this, the stand is GREAT.
+Luke Den Hartog That's a good idea.
I'm actually using it right now: imgur.com/wM1U0Au
Well for the price I think you can't beat it.
Excellent A few quid spent on a stand wouldn't go amiss. Great simple no frills review.
Did anyone notice that Clive unscrewed the base plate in a diagonal pattern ?? Like a true engineer !!!
A very well made and worthwhile Chinese product for a change my friend.
Hi Clive, How are you getting on with your 936D ? After many hundreds of hours of use my WLX-936D iron has finally given up the ghost. Simply failed to power up one morning. There is power to the microcontroller but no output (and no display) so it appears that the controller IC has died. Can't complain as it was used on a helluva lot of projects & did very well for a relatively cheap iron. Now sat in 'To Do' pile until I pick up an analogue version of control board. If I bump into one I will buy another xxx-936D as the easy temperature adjustment and stability was very handy for SMD projects, repairs, prototyping & small batch builds with temperature sensitive components. :-) Have worn out two other irons over the same time period that were almost twice the price (and not as nice to use due to fiddly temperature calibration) Only temp controlled Iron that has outlived the 936D is a big old Weller that has lasted over 20 years! (way too chunky & clumsy for modern SMD components tho..)
Excellent, good to see that this one gets a thumbs up. I noticed it has 'lead-free' on the unit and the manual, is that actually going to make any difference or is it the usual way of slapping things on to make it seem more advanced than it is?
+Matt Tester (UKMatt2000) I imagine it's something like this: xkcd.com/641/
Just ordered one of these, and has arrived just now..... there are some cheaper ones with the manual POT temp adjustment for calibration, but prefer the digital method. got a few spare so called Hakko branded tips (Doubt there are genuine, but hey, if they work, I am not bothered). You are right about the mains plug..... dam earth pin is sleeved, so that will be replaced later. One quite amusing thing I have found is the brand name; Katsu..... same name as used as a Japanese style curry :D
7:35 - I thought the same thing on mine. The rack you have is identical to the one that came with my Chinese-y Hot air/soldering station. They both also seem to be mimicking the Hakko stations with the blue/yellow color scheme. I rather like the station for what it is but Can't figure out what those holes are for!!
About those IC-sockets. I prefer to use the flat ones because you can easily turn them into surface-mountable socets for normal ICs. Also im interested about your opinion on SMD vs. Through hole components, i personally love smd because its easy to make PCBs for them at home and soldering them is often easier.
Hey Clive, great vid as allways. Until now, I am working just with trafo gun iron, but I am thinking of trying some soldering station. Those chinese ones you shown us looks fine, but I am not sure, how to calibrate 'em, since that 191 thermometer costs same price like station with equipment or even more. My question, is it possible to check it with standard thermo couple delivered with multimeter? I am not sure, what is the range of that unit (unfortunately, I get rid of all packing material also with all datasheets). Or any other way how to calibrate it? Or just try it, how it feels during soldering?
It's soldered like it ought to be...
You're not building a rocket!
My Yihua soldering station arrived with a '5 Amp' fuse in the plug. I took the fuse apart and it had more like the old 15amp fuse wire inside. I would definitely replace the fuse, if not the entire plug with a proper BS one. The wire measured about 0.4mm.
Great video Clive. What do you think is the best cheap Chinese solder station the 926D, 936D or the 937D under the various brand names?
Still love my odd Californian " Met Cal"..
Ive gone through a few irons in my time including Maplin's crappy "precision gold" .
But the Metcal is soo amazing.
I use a piece of half inch copper pipe pushed into the soldering stand. Works well to prevent the iron getting stuck.
I bought one of these. Clive should get commission.