Hi Deni:
I'm hoping to get a Hakko 936 (or it's clone) very soon and
wondering what would be the best tip to order for SMT work? I'll be
building the SoftRock Lite kit for use with my K3 so have decided
it's time to upgrade the soldering tools. I've managed a small SMT
project for my K2 using my old and trusty Weller but now want
something better. I know quite a few in this group use the Hakko so
I would appreciate some advice on iron tip sizes for SMT as well as
the normal sizes.
For what (little) it may be wroth, here is a bit of 'boilerplate'
reply which I send to folks who write me asking about tips for their
Hakko 936-x... Hope this helps.
If you have the HAKKO 936-12 (ESD) or the -09 (non-ESD), the
tips you're probably looking for are the 900M & 900L series.
The "L" series is generally a longer tip.
900M-T-LB Long, round, .008" tip, really skinny,
helpful when cleaning out PCB holes
All of the following tips are of the chisel (screwdriver) tip
type:
900M-T-I .008" (0.2mm) tip - For SMD PC boards
900M-T-1.2D .047" (1.2mm) tip --
| For PCB work. The HAKKO 936-12
900M-T-1.6D .063" (1.6mm) tip |-- and -9 models ship with the
| 900M-T-1.6D tip included
900M-T-2.4D .095" (2.4mm) tip --
900M-T-3.2D .126" (3.2mm) tip - For non-PCB work
900M-T-S3 .205" (5.2mm) tip - For heavy-duty work,
including Coax Conns.
900L-T-S1 .221" (5.6mm) tip - For heavy-duty work,
especially coax conns.
Try to select a tip which isn't longer than needed... the
longer the tip, the more heat is lost getting it to the tip.
Shorter tips generally are higher-mass and convey more heat TO
the tip.. as long as they're long enough to reach into spots
where you need to solder.
I have found the 900M-T-I (above) to work quite nicely for the
relatively small amount of SMD work I have undertaken. Nice fine
point, and easy to get in/out of the work... so far anyway.
73,
Tom Hammond N0SS
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