Do your own soldering on electric guitars?

[LSemmens]

Soldering was my stock in trade for a good part of my working life and is a skill that, once learned, is invaluable. Learn how to do it properly, and you'll never have problems. The critical bit here is properly. Otherwise you end up with potential dry joints that might come back to bite you down the track in the form of noise and open circuits, some of which only occur after the machine has warmed up. Good technique instructions.

[Bob Womack]

I've been soldering since I was a kid and have done lots of repairs on my gear over the years. Funny thing, though: As I've ended up with some really beautiful instruments, I've begun to dislike working on my instruments. It's the finishes: I've gotten scared of slipping and damaging the finishes. I adjust truss rods and intonate instruments and so forth but would just as soon leave replacing pots on an expensive guitar to my excellent luthier. It's even more funny because I'm not squeamish about working on my amps.

Bob

[moon]

Originally Posted by printer2

If I needed to buy an iron I would get a 25W Weller and a soldering gun. Don't see a need for a heat control never mind a digital one. A good flux and cleaning your metals to join gets you most of the way. Keep your tip tinned, a plastic solder sucker, a damp sponge to clean the tip every once in a while. Make sure your tip is screwed on tight.

I have done lots of jobs - including building a guitar amp - with a basic iron but I'm very glad that I now have a (cheap hakko clone) soldering station.

1. It can reach a much hotter max temperature than my old iron. That's invaluable if you have a tricky soldering job with a large mass of metal which likes to suck all the heat away from the joint. The hotter the iron, the better the chance you have to zap the joint before all the heat is lost.

In general, the task is to flash-heat the wires being soldered, and the solder itself, for the minimum amount of time necessary to create a good joint. If you're too delicate you'll get dry solder joints which may not conduct properly or, if they do pass a continuity test, may have unusually high capacitance. On the other hand, if you're too profligate with the heat, you risk damaging sensitive parts or even melting through wire insulation. It's a balance.

2. A soldering station will increase the power when it detects a drop in temperature. This helps to maintain temperature much better than a constant power iron which cannot try to compensate when heat is sucked out of the tip.

3. Variable power means that you can reduce wear on the tips by turning the iron down to a low temp while you prepare wires etc for the next joint (oxidation adds an insulating layer of rust which stops the tip getting fully hot and oxidation rates are worse the hotter the iron). When you're ready, the iron will get back up to working temperature quickly once you dial it in.

4. I can get a range of tips to fit my solder station for different types of soldering job: fine points for some of the fragile components in guitar pedals, medium "screwdriver" heads for general use, and large lumps of metal for difficult jobs where you need a big thermal inertia - such as soldering a safety ground to the chassis of a tube amp.

A soldering station isn't essential but if you can find one at a good price it's definitely worth considering. It should improve your chances of producing good joints.

Also look at eutectic solder

[Bill Yellow]

I hate soldering, but all my longest-serving guitar leads are those I soldered myself.

Always have. I hadn't known there were people who would do that for you, so it was a skill I picked up along with other elements of instrument and gear maintainence.

[Dru Edwards]

Originally Posted by muscmp

my hakko brand 40 watt just quit and i bought a weller 40 watt for $25 at home depot. it even has 3 led lights built in. great iron. don't spend any more than that unless you need a soldering station that allows 15-100 watt.

i use mine for guitar repairs, pickup changes and for guitar and audio amp repairs.

play music!

I have that same soldering iron. I just got it a few months ago and haven't used it yet. It replaced my previous Weller 40w (which didn't have the lights).

Originally Posted by Rodger Knox

I've done a little soldering....

That's a hand etched and hand soldered preamp, it's 1 1/2" x 2". Soldering was done with my ancient Weller gun. I made six or eight of these, they all work.

Wow. What do the numbers mean on the board?

[Rodger Knox]

Those are the ID codes for the components. There are transistors, capacitors, and resistors. That's actually pretty funny, they are easy to read in the photo. In person, they're too small for me to read, so I had to keep them in the original packaging until they were soldered to the board. They are SMT 1206 components.
Here's the schematic with all the component data:

[clintj]

Yes. I've got an 85W Hakko digital station and a range of tips for it. If you're going to solder to pot casings for grounding, you need plenty of power to get the joint up to temp quickly without overheating the whole pot and destroying the internals. Plenty of reserve power and a fat chisel tip are perfect for that.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

[Dru Edwards]

Hey Rodger, I thought it was probably codes for the components but wasn't sure.

Originally Posted by Rodger Knox

Those are the ID codes for the components. There are transistors, capacitors, and resistors. That's actually pretty funny, they are easy to read in the photo. In person, they're too small for me to read, so I had to keep them in the original packaging until they were soldered to the board. They are SMT 1206 components.
Here's the schematic with all the component data:
<<snippet pics>>

[alnico5]

I've been soldering since the 60s and have scars to prove it.

[FrankHudson]

Originally Posted by Hurricane Bob

I soldered as a kid when I had a train set with HO slot cars and built little towns with lights all over the place. I bought the stew mac soldering iron for $40.00 after using a high powered gun iron and frying out pots on one of my guitars. I still am not great at soldering but I can only get better.

Just like me, slot cars taught me to solder when I was a kid. Alas, I'm probably worse at now than I was as a teenager, not better.

[dhalbert]

I built a few electronic kits starting not quite 50 years ago and then a lot more stuff. So my soldering is OK. Build a kit or two and you'll get a lot of practice. Don't use a gun for most purposes: use a decent iron. I have an old Ungar - not as good as something like the Hakko station, but good enough.

Soldering is not paste-spreading. Heat the pieces enough so that they are hot enough to melt the solder.

Some helpful guides:

https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-...lent-soldering

http://ljkrakauer.com/LJK/80s90s/heathsolder.htm

[Jeff Scott]

I do my own soldering.

[jsanfilippo5]

I do my own soldering for a long time now - I actually learned when I went to school to be an audio engineer. A very large part of the curriculum was soldering and I remember making a pretty decent sounding preamp. Wish I still had that!