Can anyone point me towards some resources for learning surface mount soldering and repair?
I taught myself THT soldering but I still suck at DE-soldering unfortunately, just to give you an idea of my experience level.
My employer has said they would pay for training, but I’m not sure where to start or what even to look for.
TIA for any advice you might have!
I’d probably take something down to FUTO and ask around:
You could do worse than having Louis Rossmann teach you soldering and desoldering.
For desoldering, unless I can do it with two soldering irons (FAST!), I use the hot air gun.
The hot air gun is simply an exercise in patience. Slow and steady–blow the gun on the target for 5-10 seconds, let it cool for 5-10 seconds, repeat ad nauseam until the temperature finally comes up to the solder melt point. Yeah, it’s a pain and it’s slow–get over it as that’s just the way it is.
People with a lot of practice can do it faster. However, I also find that the people who do it faster have a lot more destroyed chips than I do. It’s all about priorities. I’m not doing production so I don’t care about throughput.
NASA helpfully publishes standards for soldering:
https://workmanship.nasa.gov/lib/insp/2%20books/links/sections/files/601.pdf
Thanks for the tips!
I think I like Rossman’s rants more than his instructional videos, which I haven’t seen in a long time.