Re: time to ditch my $20 25w iron and get sumpin' REAL!!!



Everyone talked me into it, I bought the Hakko 936 SMD soldering station.

It's a fantastic setup, seems like I was fumbling around in the dark until I got the 808 dedoldering gun and the 936.

I can remove old components and have new ones soldered in the time it took my old Elenco station to heat up.

Thanks for the advice....

Re: List of Bad Cap Manufacturers

I have been upgrading some phono preamps lately and found these caps:

Xunda
L.H. Nova
Fujicon
Acon

I replaced them with Panasonic's not because they were failing but because they seem cheap and nasty, there was an improvement in performance in every case.

Makes me wonder about the poly caps in them now.

Re: time to ditch my $20 25w iron and get sumpin' REAL!!!

I have a cheap elenco soldering station and once the iron gives out I am thinking of buying a Weller 35watt with smaller tips, can't see why it won't work as it plugs straight in. I use the same heat setting for all PCB work.

I recently got a Hakko 808 de soldering gun, it is the best thing I have ever bought. It makes short work of through hole capacitors, and removing op amps is a breeze even with lead free solder. Leaves the pads looking like new. Couldn't recommend it more highly.

I recently bought a used Cambridge Audio 640P phono preamp.

I thought it didn't sound right, being overly bright compared to my other phono stages.

I got it as a project because I have read many threads about improving the sound by upgrading the capacitors.

I opened it up and all the electrolytic's are labeled Xunda.

The funny thing is this unit is not very old but there is brown stuff that looks like it either leaked from inside or it could be the outer coating has melted.

Not a good sign.

I ordered replacements for...