Poll: Poll: Do you have a soldering iron?

[yoinkF]

I have two at home, an Antex 25w plug in iron that I bought back in my college days (still use it for certain jobs) and a Hakko Fx888d soldering station. I do a lot of soldering, both through hole and SMD and I like to think I'm fairly good at it! I Learned soldering when I was a kid by building the projects in an old Usborne electronics book using tag boards my granddad had from his days working at the telephone exchange!

 

[badgeruk]

Yep but mine at home are a bit naff now. Access to loads of decent ones at work due to working in electronics. Can hand solder down to 0603 with ease plus various ic sizes. Just takes practise really.

 

[danza]

Used to solder frequently for work, have an iron at home.

 

[HoneyBadger]

I have 2

 

[darael]

I have one, but I'm not overly confident in using it. I've managed to save a monitor (replaced capacitors) and laptop (charging plug) with it so fair.

 

[Deleted member 66701]

Is this a cunning way of figuring out the male / female ration of the forums?

 

[Rroff]

Is this a cunning way of figuring out the male / female ration of the forums?

I dunno about that - out of the university age people I know (somewhat to my surprise) more females are studying software engineering or electronics engineering than males.

 

[kindai]

Yup, Jack Bauer taught me to use it.

 

[cyber69]

Weller 60watt solder iron here last used to repair an IBM 5154 ega colour monitor

 

[Steeps]

Not got one in the house, never learned to use one (hammering nails in a board was the extent of D+T at school), borrowed one to solder cable to some LED strips years ago, still works so I must have done something right.

 

[Akagi]

I have access to one, I haven't used one for years though, but I think I was competent at soldering. Could probably still do it after a while of fumbling around and burning myself.

 

[bledd]

I have one, but I'm not confident with it. I only really use it for joining cables together.

-edit, fixed a headphone jack on my mp3 player before, but I've never tried any work on a PCB.

 

[Amp34]

Used to have one, but not currently.

I do however have a blowtorch and solder, although I usually use it on pipes rather than electronics.

And yes, i'm confident using both soldering Iron and blowtorch.

 

[atpbx]

I have an ancient one, that my father in law gave me five or 6 years now.

I've used it a couple of times.

 

[Squark]

Yup. I'm barely competent though.

Likewise

 

[adolf hamster]

yes i do, not a particularly good one, but it does the job when needs be. would use it fairly regularly because the airsoft battery manufacturers are still stuck in the world of the ye olde tamiya plug, and i hate crimp connectors.

i'm confident enough in using it- nothing i've soldered has fell apart yet

 

[FloppyPoppy]

Yes but it's terrible and far to large for most things i could ever need it for.

 

[Bennyedgehog]

Cheap one from Aldi, did fix my second monitor with it (bulging capacitors).

 

[robj20]

Only time I trip up is when there is a need to use lead free were only allowed to use leaded solder at work so much nicer to work with. Today I have around 100 pcbs to reconfigure with a mix of 0ohm, 75ohm and 47ohm plus some capacitors.

 

[Deleted member 77746]

Yes I have one and yes I can solder.