ajw22
Member
- Joined
- Nov 16, 2018
- Messages
- 733
I've tried several soldering irons andall sorts of soldering techniques. I've developed my own, which I believe is superior to anything I have seen on YouTube. It's certainly not how I learned to solder "properly", but it seems to work best for 18650s. And no, the solder is not "balled" - the contact is solid and cannot be simply scraped off.
See video in link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1l7_27rwvympgwB3sQa-rqzcsUvJLoX0V/view
Soldering iron: 70W Taiyo ElectricPX-401, set to ~390C,with 5mm diameter"large tip for high thermal-storage", but cut at anangle to allow pointed contact.
Solder: Standard 60/40 rosin core, 1mm diameter
I think this technique works well, because:
1) The rosin has no time to boil away and gets to work immediately, maximizing its effectiveness
2) While the iron is fairly massive, the actual contact area is small at perhapsjust 3mm diameter, thus heating all the area I need and not more.
3) The molten solder ensures maximum heat transfer to the cell surface in the shortest time, as opposed to pre-heating with a "dry" tip and then applying solder
The negative side is a bit more challenging, because some of the heat gets drawn into the cell. But it's basically the same procedure. Just a little steeper angle to make the contact area smaller, and perhaps 2 seconds of contact. Hopefully ending with something like this:
See video in link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1l7_27rwvympgwB3sQa-rqzcsUvJLoX0V/view
Soldering iron: 70W Taiyo ElectricPX-401, set to ~390C,with 5mm diameter"large tip for high thermal-storage", but cut at anangle to allow pointed contact.
Solder: Standard 60/40 rosin core, 1mm diameter
I think this technique works well, because:
1) The rosin has no time to boil away and gets to work immediately, maximizing its effectiveness
2) While the iron is fairly massive, the actual contact area is small at perhapsjust 3mm diameter, thus heating all the area I need and not more.
3) The molten solder ensures maximum heat transfer to the cell surface in the shortest time, as opposed to pre-heating with a "dry" tip and then applying solder
The negative side is a bit more challenging, because some of the heat gets drawn into the cell. But it's basically the same procedure. Just a little steeper angle to make the contact area smaller, and perhaps 2 seconds of contact. Hopefully ending with something like this: