Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

[Spork Schivago]

Hello,

Can someone give me some suggestions on how to desolder a surface mount mini / micro USB port? I'm especially having trouble with the shield. I tried hot air on the experimental one and although I was able to successfully remove it from the PCB, the plastic was all melted (didn't realize the bottom of the plastic was melting out). I've had trouble before with shields that were a bit larger in size (like 4 - 6 USB ports). It's always the shields I have trouble with. Is there a trick or something? Do I just need a beefy soldering iron with a large tip? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[stj]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

heat the top of the tabs with an iron and slip a razor blade under them.

that's what i do with large tabs on sockets anyway.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

Okay, do you have a suggestion as to what temperature I should be using and what wattage iron? I have a crappy radio shack digital soldering station (80 watt I think?) and then a Weller WX2, but so far, I only have the micro soldering iron. I was thinking of perhaps investing in one of the bigger ones for stuff like this. I know they make a 120 watt, I want to say there's an 80 watt as well? Anyway, I tried with my Weller micro soldering iron 694F and it wasn't able to melt the solder...I believe the shield is absorbing the heat Stj. This is where a bigger iron would come in handy, right?

Still learning! I've seemed to of gotten pretty good at soldering, just desoldering I still struggle with. Small stuff I'm okay with, but shields and stuff soldered to grounding planes seem to give me trouble.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

Actually, after checking, I believe it can handle 120 watt and a 200 watt (for the bigger irons). Something like the WXP120 and the WXP200.

[stj]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

i think i'm going to need a drink.

you need a temperature controlled iron, not a huge iron.

why do you want to lift this?
normally people rip them off and you have to put them back down again!

[dj_ricoh]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

Mini usb ports like cellphone ports?

If yes let's begin.

1. Every time you want to desolder you need to take the old solder out. Mix new solder on pins and holding pins (base pins) and use wick to take it out.
No special iron required here big tip and max power recommend. Do this procedure until the base pins that holds the usb port its almost free of solder. Data pins and voltage its easy because they are small.

Why I say to do this because it requires less time with hot air until it comes off. If you don't do this you have a chance to rip off the V pins or data pins and you done.

Again old solder needs to come off with all cost.
Mix wick out.

Now after all solder it's off you can use hot air with max temp of 380c. My hot air station got air debit from 1 to 8. I use max on 2 . Above 2 components start to fly off the board. Even when you work on smd level.

Cleaning wholes same thing mix wick out. (Needles if required)
2. Soldering back. NO HOT AIR STATION

Big tip with max power on base pins with wholes.

Data pins I use weller with 0.2mm tip. But if you don't got it 1mm max its ok.

Microscope its essential in this job.

Good luck if this is what you wanted

[stj]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

none of that counts for a surface-mount socket.

[dj_ricoh]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

What do you mean?

[stj]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

the contacts are under the edge, you cant really get an iron on them - only hot air.

[dj_ricoh]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

O lol.
Did you just say that? Do I feel someone gave up?

Google bend weller tip.

You should see how nice are ps4 hdmi ports and how inside are.

Had a half van full with ps4 with video and hdmi ports broken.
Got a friend working in a recycle point.

Yeee soldering with iron needs to be nr1 skill.

There is no NO.

There is only do it. I don't care how. This is how ppl around me thinks.

Ever solder with a hot nail? I'll make a picture of my iron that pays my bills. Almost 2 kg with gas

[stj]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

no nail,
but i have made custom tips before inc a "banana" tip probably similar to what your describing.

[SteveNielsen]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

I've used nails, screws for iron tips and wire from a clothes hanger and thick gauge copper wire for a gun tips. Not saying any of them worked all that great though.

On topic, I've had horrible luck trying to use an iron and wick to remove such a port and because the damage caused by flexing the plug had pulled up traces it proved impossible for me to reinstall a new port. There is just no way to get wires soldered to the port with my smallest cone tip. Maybe someone with steadier hands could, but not me.

[dj_ricoh]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

I embrace every technique and every methods.

I sit near the poll in ibiza and the only thing I took with me is a phone and acess to net to stay here on badcaps to read all day.

I think that sharing what I learn from this website and my will its the best thing I can do.

If you got another methode aside air station to take it off when there is no solder on pins and using small bended tips to solder it back plz share it .
Everybody who tought me to do good things they said to say thank you when you get something for free. Please let me say thank you by showing me another way to solder a charging port or other ports in 20 min.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

i think i'm going to need a drink.

you need a temperature controlled iron, not a huge iron.

why do you want to lift this?
normally people rip them off and you have to put them back down again!

Both my soldering irons are temperature controlled. However, because the Weller's micro iron is soooo small, I don't think it disperses the heat properly. For example, when I have the heat set to 695F, I can feel the whole shield getting hot, but it doesn't get nearly hot enough to melt the solder. I thought a larger iron might help this.

I want to lift this because I need a mini-USB port and don't really have time to order one. I have some spare boards I found lying around with mini USB ports. I'd like to remove one and use it. I need to "hard mod" my brother's 3DS in order to downgrade it from the latest firmware to a lower version, 4.2. The goal is to permanently add a mini-USB port to the 3DS to read and write directly to the NAND chip.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

Mini usb ports like cellphone ports?

If yes let's begin.

1. Every time you want to desolder you need to take the old solder out. Mix new solder on pins and holding pins (base pins) and use wick to take it out.
No special iron required here big tip and max power recommend. Do this procedure until the base pins that holds the usb port its almost free of solder. Data pins and voltage its easy because they are small.

Why I say to do this because it requires less time with hot air until it comes off. If you don't do this you have a chance to rip off the V pins or data pins and you done.

Again old solder needs to come off with all cost.
Mix wick out.

Now after all solder it's off you can use hot air with max temp of 380c. My hot air station got air debit from 1 to 8. I use max on 2 . Above 2 components start to fly off the board. Even when you work on smd level.

Cleaning wholes same thing mix wick out. (Needles if required)
2. Soldering back. NO HOT AIR STATION

Big tip with max power on base pins with wholes.

Data pins I use weller with 0.2mm tip. But if you don't got it 1mm max its ok.

Microscope its essential in this job.

Good luck if this is what you wanted

Thank you! I won't be soldering the mini USB port back down (I'm not replacing it, just need it for "hard modding" a 3DS to read and write to the NAND). So the hot air is for the shield? I can get the pins unsoldered just fine, it's just the shield that I'm struggling with. I'll try with my radio shack station because I have many tips and it's much larger than the one I have the Weller right now.

I have a Weller WHA-900 for my hot air station. I also have a Weller WHP-3000 preheater. My WHA-900 goes from 1 to 10 for air speed. I believe 1 is 5l/min and 10 is 50l/min. I might be wrong on this though. Here's a link to my hot air station:
http://www.weller-toolsus.com/rework...650w-120v.html

Because the iron I'm using with my Weller WX2 is for micro soldering, I think the problem is the shield justs dissipates the heat and the solder never gets hot enough to melt. Using the hot air should fix this.

I think the mistake I made the first time was using the hot air rework station on whole thing at way to high of an air speed. I put the smallest nozzle on and got the shield unsoldered, then I used it on the pins at an angle. I think the air that I was using on the pins melted the plastic, not the air I used on the shield.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

the contacts are under the edge, you cant really get an iron on them - only hot air.

Actually, I can get to all the pins on both boards with my iron. One is a much older design and has long pins in the back. Really easy to get too. The other one though, I can't get to with a normal sized iron, but with my iron for SMD components, it's small enough to fit under the little edge back there so I can access them. It really was worth the extra cash for this thing. If you do a lot of SMD work, I highly recommend one. I can hook ya up with a discount code on TEquipment.NET. The control unit cost me less than 400$ (actually, it was almost 300$). Then I bought a used micro iron off Amazon for around 70$. It came with a stand and it looked like it was only used maybe a few times at best. Even came with the box.

With the micro soldering iron, I've been able to finish so many projects that I haven't been able to finish before. The radio shack digital soldering station I owned, it was just garbage man. I still keep it around for bigger stuff until I can get a bigger iron for my Weller. Half the time, with the radio shack one, the tip wouldn't even get hot enough to melt solder. Probably something with the ceramic heating element or something. Other times, it'd get extremely hot.

[dj_ricoh]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

I still don't understand what shield your talking about.

Make a picture and upload it here so we can all see.

[stj]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

i think he means the connector body.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

I've always called them shields, I just thought that was what they were called. Is the proper term connector body? Here's a picture. The red square box is what I'm talking about. When I try touching an iron to one of the four legs that hold this connector body down, the connector body would get hot but the solder wouldn't melt. Had this exact same problem with the 4 port USB connector on a PS3. Ended up having to cut the pins that held the connector body to the board. Then I was able to successfully unsolder them. It seems the bigger the connector body, the more impossible it is to remove without heating the whole thing.

The picture is of the mini USB port that I ruined before posting my first post here asking for help. I will attempt it again on my second one, using the heat gun on the connector body but only after I unsolder the pins (which won't be a problem). I'll use a small razor to carefully lift the pads up on the connector body and do them one by one. Thanks guys, I'll let you know how I make out.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: Need help with mini USB desoldering technique.

I knew I could count on you guys to show me how to do this! Successfully got the second one off with no damage at all! Just gotta make sure there's continuity between the cable I made and the wires I'm going to solder on to the pins on the mini USB cable. Thank you guys so much!!! I used a hot air rework station for the connector body, but only after I removed the solder from the pins on the back there. I also used an exacto knife to lift up the connectors for the connector body, the ones I was having trouble with. Did one at a time and she came right off! Thank you guys!!!!