Quick solder critique please?

[wholphin]

I've taken apart an old Chicony board to harvest for parts, and figured it'd be a good a time as any to practice my soldering before I let myself loose on any of my other boards. Could I please get a quick critique of my solder job from the below pictures? I'm keen to improve before moving onto more expensive things . Overall, I don't think I've done an awful job, but I'm worried I might have a cold solder joint in  a couple of places, #12 being a prime example.

Cheers,
wholphin

(Mods, if this somehow belongs elsewhere (like 'The Living Soldering Thread'?), please move it or let me know.)

General overview

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(http://i.imgur.com/H9Gom5Jl.jpg)

Zoom in on 1-2

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(http://i.imgur.com/wfu5ONNl.jpg)

Zoom in on 3-4

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(http://i.imgur.com/8A0wDF9l.jpg)

Zoom in on 5-6

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(http://i.imgur.com/jwAhuApl.jpg)

Zoom in on 7-8

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(http://i.imgur.com/ap7nX6Ol.jpg)

Zoom in on 9-10

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(http://i.imgur.com/mYwm6whl.jpg)

Zoom in on 11-12

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(http://i.imgur.com/OTJlyCgl.jpg)

[CPTBadAss]

Nice job overall. Joint #10 is a nice joint and you should shoot to have that for all the rest of your joints. The rest look fine but I worry about #1 and #2 because the pad isn't fully covered. I've had cold joints which looked like that.

[DrHubblePhD]

Overall not bad, but you certainly need to be careful to not damage the pad since it seems many if not all of your joints are not completely covering  where the pad should be.

[Lastpilot]

Do you know what temperature your iron is at? Judging from the pictures it looks like you might be spending too much time waiting for solder to melt.

[smknjoe]

They look very good from what I can see, but those aren't real high res pics. If anything, they may have a little too much solder. The joints should be slightly concave and those look slightly convex. Overall, they look very nice. Good job!

[wholphin]

Nice job overall. Joint #10 is a nice joint and you should shoot to have that for all the rest of your joints. The rest look fine but I worry about #1 and #2 because the pad isn't fully covered. I've had cold joints which looked like that.

Alright, I'll keep that in mind about #10, #1 and #2.

Overall not bad, but you certainly need to be careful to not damage the pad since it seems many if not all of your joints are not completely covering  where the pad should be.

Yeah, if I was doing this on one of my nicer boards, I'd definitely be desoldering those and trying again .

Do you know what temperature your iron is at? Judging from the pictures it looks like you might be spending too much time waiting for solder to melt.

My iron is set to 350°C (662°F) - I will try again with a slightly higher temperature. I may need to calibrate my iron (new Hakko FX-888D). I'm unhappy with the solder I'm using anyway (cheapo rosin cored 60% tin 40% lead), and may use this as an opportunity to splash out on some nice solder.

They look very good from what I can see, but those aren't real high res pics. If anything, they may have a little too much solder. The joints should be slightly concave and those look slightly convex. Overall, they look very nice. Good job!

Hmm OK. I'll see if I can get a repeat of #10 with a bit less solder overall.




Thanks all for your feedback - I've found it invaluable so far

[Lastpilot]

My iron is set to 350°C (662°F) - I will try again with a slightly higher temperature. I may need to calibrate my iron (new Hakko FX-888D). I'm unhappy with the solder I'm using anyway (cheapo rosin cored 60% tin 40% lead), and may use this as an opportunity to splash out on some nice solder.

As long as you can get it to melt without holding onto the pad too long (when I learned I referenced WhiteFireDragon youtube soldering style as a guide).

I also agree with CPTBadAss, you'd be fine with these joints overall, and you don't have to be _crazy_ picky about it. But yeah, since you want to improve, being able to cover the entire pad without spending too much iron-contact time on the PCB will result in cleaner looking joints. And I've only used one type of solder so I can't speak to the quality difference   

[Joey Quinn]

My iron is set to 350°C (662°F) - I will try again with a slightly higher temperature. I may need to calibrate my iron (new Hakko FX-888D). I'm unhappy with the solder I'm using anyway (cheapo rosin cored 60% tin 40% lead), and may use this as an opportunity to splash out on some nice solder.

As long as you can get it to melt without holding onto the pad too long (when I learned I referenced WhiteFireDragon youtube soldering style as a guide).

I also agree with CPTBadAss, you'd be fine with these joints overall, and you don't have to be _crazy_ picky about it. But yeah, since you want to improve, being able to cover the entire pad without spending too much iron-contact time on the PCB will result in cleaner looking joints. And I've only used one type of solder so I can't speak to the quality difference   

I second covering the pads more. Also 350 C should be perfect, that's what I've been using on my 888D for a while and I've used it to assemble several boards.

If you want better solder buy .020 Kester 44

http://www.amazon.com/Kester-Rosin-Core-Solder-Dispense-Pak/dp/B00AYJ0B7Y

[wholphin]

My iron is set to 350�C (662�F) - I will try again with a slightly higher temperature. I may need to calibrate my iron (new Hakko FX-888D). I'm unhappy with the solder I'm using anyway (cheapo rosin cored 60% tin 40% lead), and may use this as an opportunity to splash out on some nice solder.

As long as you can get it to melt without holding onto the pad too long (when I learned I referenced WhiteFireDragon youtube soldering style as a guide).

I also agree with CPTBadAss, you'd be fine with these joints overall, and you don't have to be _crazy_ picky about it. But yeah, since you want to improve, being able to cover the entire pad without spending too much iron-contact time on the PCB will result in cleaner looking joints. And I've only used one type of solder so I can't speak to the quality difference   

Cheers, will aim for a bit less time on the pad - I notice WhiteFireDragon has a tendency to use a chisel tip, whereas I was using a normal 'pointy' tip. May give that a go and see if that gets me a bit more heat transfer as his videos seem to indicate.

My iron is set to 350�C (662�F) - I will try again with a slightly higher temperature. I may need to calibrate my iron (new Hakko FX-888D). I'm unhappy with the solder I'm using anyway (cheapo rosin cored 60% tin 40% lead), and may use this as an opportunity to splash out on some nice solder.

As long as you can get it to melt without holding onto the pad too long (when I learned I referenced WhiteFireDragon youtube soldering style as a guide).

I also agree with CPTBadAss, you'd be fine with these joints overall, and you don't have to be _crazy_ picky about it. But yeah, since you want to improve, being able to cover the entire pad without spending too much iron-contact time on the PCB will result in cleaner looking joints. And I've only used one type of solder so I can't speak to the quality difference   

I second covering the pads more. Also 350 C should be perfect, that's what I've been using on my 888D for a while and I've used it to assemble several boards.

If you want better solder buy .020 Kester 44

http://www.amazon.com/Kester-Rosin-Core-Solder-Dispense-Pak/dp/B00AYJ0B7Y

I've seen Kester solder being recommended on The Living Soldering thread - may have to bite the bullet and purchase some. Next payday though




Thanks again to everyone for the feedback!

[__red__]

In general it's difficult to really ascertain through-hole joint quality with pictures from above.  I look for two things:

0. Shape of the joint from the side (think "Tent").
1. Color of the joint (Think shiny).

[wholphin]

In general it's difficult to really ascertain through-hole joint quality with pictures from above.  I look for two things:

0. Shape of the joint from the side (think "Tent").
1. Color of the joint (Think shiny).

Fair enough - I'll try and keep this in mind too. Seems fairly consistent with what I've seen elsewhere.

[Wilba]

They all look fine to me. All of these joints look like they're completely covering the pad. All I see are a few small slivers on the edges, where the hole in the solder mask was bigger than the copper, hence it's that same mustard yellow colour as the text (@2, #3, etc.), and some flux residue. So I don't get why people think these pads might not be fully covered.

[smknjoe]

I didn't see any exposed solder pads either.

[wholphin]

They all look fine to me. All of these joints look like they're completely covering the pad. All I see are a few small slivers on the edges, where the hole in the solder mask was bigger than the copper, hence it's that same mustard yellow colour as the text (@2, #3, etc.), and some flux residue. So I don't get why people think these pads might not be fully covered.

They all look fine to me. All of these joints look like they're completely covering the pad. All I see are a few small slivers on the edges, where the hole in the solder mask was bigger than the copper, hence it's that same mustard yellow colour as the text (@2, #3, etc.), and some flux residue. So I don't get why people think these pads might not be fully covered.

Yeah it's a bit visually deceptive. Was showing a mate and mentioned the uncovered pads and he said the same thing. Oh well.

[__red__]

Sorry to be the downer here but coverage of a pad is NOT a metric for a good solder joint.

It is very easy to have a joint which covers the entire pad but still not be connected.

Here's a great image of types of soldering fail.  Note that some of them have solder all over the pad but still fail.



Take a look through the rest of the page here: http://www.bluepill.co/?page_id=82

Bad joints typically happen because of either temperature problems or corrosion.  Flux and heat are your friends.