soldering iron tip help

spudman029 · Tue Dec 22, 2009 2:51 am

Hello all,

I'm working on making new solding iron tips. The problem is, the tips are not getting near the same temperature as the iron itself. On the inside threads of the end of the iron I am getting over 400*F on a digital thermometer, however when I screw in a stainless steel tip it will only show about 275*F. This means I am loosing some heat transfer somewhere. Is there anything I can do to help get the tip temperatures the same as the iron? Is there another metal I should use? I was thinking copper might conduct heat better.

spudamine · Tue Dec 22, 2009 3:45 am

I think soldering iron tips are made from copper, very high thermal conductivity and probably a lot easier to tin with solder. stainless steel on the other hand has lousy thermal conductivity.( it's about 40W/(m.K)compared to copper at 400 and aluminium halfway between the two)

Larda · Tue Dec 22, 2009 6:31 am

Exactly, if you are going to make your own tips use copper.
Long life soldering tips uses copper and high end ones sometimes even silver core that's plated with iron to give them a much longer life (~50x a normal none plated copper).

metalmeltr · Tue Dec 22, 2009 6:38 am

What brand of iron do you have? I have never herd of one having SS tips.

kenbo0422 · Tue Dec 22, 2009 7:36 am

I have 2 Weller soldering irons and even though they use different types of tips, they are copper and heat up very fast.

A copper rod drilled out to fit over your heating element should work very well. Just taper the end to suit your needs.

spudman029 · Tue Dec 22, 2009 10:22 am

metalmeltr wrote:What brand of iron do you have? I have never herd of one having SS tips.

It's a cheap one from radio shack, so there's your answer.

Thanks for the info everyone.

Technician1002 · Tue Dec 22, 2009 12:18 pm

A good Weller has a tip that slides inside a thin element and the tip temperature is sensed, not the temp of the heater. Often it is sensed magnetically as iron in the tip loses magnetism as it heats.

metalmeltr · Tue Dec 22, 2009 1:52 pm

I would recomend investing in a Weller.

Larda · Tue Dec 22, 2009 6:49 pm

Here is the soldering iron from one of my ERSA soldering stations, you can see the thin element and that is measures the temperature only a few mm from the tip.
Because of this its very fast to regulate the temperature and it heats up from room temperature to 280°C in 12 seconds.

soldering iron tip help

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