T12 Soldering Iron Case and Power Supply

[@Tocsin-Bang]

Leaving soldering irons on is something I'm always doing. It's one of the reasons I've ordered one of these, should arrive within the next week!

[@wernervanschie5857]

Compliments for your work and thanks for the video. Considering buying a preassembled one, this gives good info! Greetings from The Netherlands. 🇳🇱

[@davethompson9959]

Yes, as you found out the yellow is earth,, the vibration switch is supposed to have the gold lead at 1, closest to lead, the holes in the handle pcb are to feed the wires thru and solder to pads, unbreakable strain relief,, a bit of pain due to their springiness

[@Tocsin-Bang]

Clearing soldered holes is easier with either a solder sucker, or what a repair guy told me years ago is a fine pencil lead (solder won't stick to it).

[@MobiusHorizons]

+Stephen Cook its also much easier with the large K tip of the T12 iron. I'll have to try the pencil lead trick, though.

[@solidhit2]

Thank you for this video, I have a 24V 1A power supply, will it do for this soldering station, what's the current consumption?

[@MobiusHorizons]

I have a video on that. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hGK9c3uBh8aejKM, but the TL;DR is it likes to draw ~2.5A

[@Myrwok_Worzylux]

19v - 2.38A - 45W / 24V- 3A - 72W

[@SianaGearz]

With the amount of things you find you soldered in wrong, you need one of these soldering irons with integrated desoldering pump. Not the RadioShack kind with a silly little rectal bulb, the other ones.

[@erkano3978]

Hi, I have just bought a same unit and it did not came with instructions. What is the purpose of the flashing LED? When I press the rotary dial, it shows 30 - any idea? My unit came with 3 digit display, is it possible to change to a multi info display LED panel? Thanks

[@MobiusHorizons]

+Erkan O unfortunately I do not know what all the register settings mean. One is how long it should sit idle before dropping to 200 deg. Another is how long before it sleeps, but I don't know the rest. The flashing led shows when its powering the iron. On mine it goes solid on startup, and starts blinking once it's up to temperature. There is also a dot on the 3 digit display that blinks when it detects movement.

[@erkano3978]

MobiusHorizons Thanks for the quick reply 👍👍👍

[@travassosvaldez]

Hello Anyone have a schematic to ground the tip of this unit? I ordered one. But before she arrives I wanted to find, so I can make the changes when she arrives. Best regards

[@jeffdewe]

With mine I took the board out, Underneath the board I soldered a with to where the earth pin is soldered, then on the back of the unit I drilled a hole for a screw and attached the wire with a crimp to the screw, I then took a #2 Philips + and turned it about 10 times in each of the rear 4 screw holes on the back plate, this quickly removed the anodized plating. I assembled it and tested it, and yes the earth ground works on the case and right to the tip of soldering iron.

[@mikelemon5109]

Do the T12 tips have a thermostat built in? if yes what would be the pinout?

[@MobiusHorizons]

They do, but i'm not sure of the pinout.

[@mildyproductive9726]

From what I understand, the T12 tips, themselves, have only 3 connections. Sheath/earth is one (which would be obvious just looking at it, lol. This would likely be the one closest to the tip, I imagine) Then they have 2 connections for the heater/thermocouple, which are in series. So w/e two pins show resistance (of about 2 ohms, cold) are to the heater/tcouple. I would imagine they would be the two closest to the back end of the tip.. if you imagine a TRS stereo connector, this is what would be logical. Then, if you heat it up and measure the voltage, you will see which is the positive and which is the negative, as far as the output of the thermocouple is concerned. So the 8 pin connector on a Hakko FM2027 is pretty ridiculous. I think they use a pin or two for the LED ring. And there might be some extra pins, too. This is probably so you don't try to plug it into an older, incompatible hakko station. But some of the Chinese T12 clones use only a 3 pin connector. To put it into perspective, the 888D handpiece (which probably IS compatible with some 937 and earlier irons with 5 pin DIN) has a 6 pin DIN, but the 6th pin isn't even connected to anything. BTW, I would assume putting the heater and the thermocouple in series makes the T12 tips and handpieces cheaper to produce as well as ultimately making the connection to the handpiece more reliable and durable.

[@seniorfrog7391]

Michael the pi out is (clock wise facing connector ) pin 1 ground (earth)(green) pin 2 + voltage (red) pin 3 + vib switch (white) pin 4 - vib switch (blue) pin 5 - voltage (black)

[@akcesoriumpc6421]

yeah you "belive" tips is grounded but you are to lazy to even check it, i tell you a secret is not grounded

[@MFrisberg]

Nice vid mate

[@stevesm2010]

Nice build - I was thinking whist you de-soldered the front connector, 'Paul should use a hot-air gun' LOL Probably a smaller nozzle would have helped ;-) Isn't the foam a bit of a fire hazard?

[@MobiusHorizons]

I still need to get a proper hot air station. The one I used was just a hot air gun from the hardware store, which doesn't have small nozzles. The foam was mostly to provide a barrier between the mains voltage on the pins sticking out the underside of the board and the anodized aluminum below it. It doesn't seem to be getting very hot, but I suppose it could become a fire hazard. Would you suggest a different separator material? maybe perfboard?

[@klcbsoft]

Ahoi Paul, Good show, very entertaining, thanks for sharing! Saw your vid as recommendation as I was checking out the T12 and discussing heat-issues on VoltLog's site about this product. Here's a word of warning though: klcbsoft.com/img/psu-after-3-years.jpg That is what ALL cheap PSUs will look like after a few years. PCB on the output side completely roasted, all caps in the vicinity totally dried out, the MBR20100-diode pack on the heatsink operating on it's last leg (and producing enormous amounts of heat that burn through the PCB). I wanted to share the above image as you were stuffing your case with foam. The case in the T12 is closed and has no ventilation at all. Stuffing it with foam will make the temperatures even more ungodly than they already are. This will dry out your output filter caps (close to heatsink) and that will cause even more current drain and more heat. That foam will for sure melt down onto your PCB from above and the sides, stick to it from underneath, melt and give way for shorting out solder pins with the chassis. Just be careful with that foam - greetings!

[@MobiusHorizons]

thanks for the warning. I have replaced the foam with little self-adhesive standoffs as suggested by +standishgeezer. Unfortunately the ones he mentioned are not the right size for the holes in the PSU, so I'll find better ones, and put out a video.

[@klcbsoft]

Excellent, little standoffs as used for motherboards should also do the trick. Adhesive might also be susceptible for breakage under temperatures. The case under the output-heatsink will reach 50° C for sure (more in the years to come when caps dry out) and the main PCB might start floating around. There's some contacts very close to edges on that PCB and what's even more important: check if the heatsinks are soldered to the PCB and maybe used as "traces" (jumpers). If that's the case then the heatsinks are "live" and may carry several hundred volts to your chassis. Looking forward to your vids!

[@NoName-bt3oy]

Why not mount the PCB to the upper lid. Drill through lid, then drill and tap the heatsinks and bolt them together. Turn the case into directly coupled heat-exchanger.

[@MobiusHorizons]

+NoName that's not a bad idea. I might have to try that

[@chrischris3629]

Tell me who wants to listen to this godamm awful music when they are watching a technical video and hoping to learn something