What are the best tools for through hole desoldering in 2023? Test and showdown

Let's look at desoldering through hole components on difficult PCB with heavy ground planes like motherboards and similar. I bought a selection of desoldering tools out of my own hard earned money and challenged them against each other in a real life head to head test. Find out what is the best desoldering equipment for through hole components and what you should use if you are on a tight budget
CHAPTERS
00:00:00 Intro
00:04:04 Desoldering Components With Soldering Iron
00:09:26 Desoldering With Braid
00:13:43 Desoldering With Solder Sucker
00:19:24 Using Manual Desoldering Iron
00:28:43 Automatic Desoldering Iron
00:32:29 Vacuum Desoldering Gun
00:34:29 Conclusion
Previous video using different methods
• How To Desolder Compon...
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Thank you
Richard

[@WillKruger]

On the 28:44 solenoid pump desoldering iron. I just bought one of these because of the reasonable price. I found it worked perfectly, if you use the right technic. Put it squarely on the underside let it melt the solder, hit the button quickly remove the iron and then let go of the button.

[@LittlePetieWheat]

Love the way you are always trying to improve knowledge of technique / tools (for everyone). Thanks :-)

[@M0NXF]

The best solder sucker hand pump i have found is the ENGINEER SS-02 made in Japan

[@Douglas_Blake_579]

For the gold coloured spring solder sucker .... make a small notch in the end of the suction tip to just fit over the iron tip. That gives you a much better coverage over the hole and a lot more direct suction.

[@thedeester100]

And use a much finer tip on the Iron itself? I have found that the "tips" from flux syringes can be modified to fit the end of the manual sucker. Because they have a hollow metal needle you can fit them over fine pins and heat the needle with the soldering iron, then manually suck. They do clog up petty easily though so I find it best to remove as much solder as possible before using the "needle modded" manual sucker. That said solder doesnt seem to stick good to the chrome needle so it can be prodded out quite easily. Its just time consuming.

[@hernancoronel]

At around 6:30 I think the idea is the other way around: put the pump on the solder side and heat it from the component side. In that way you should get a great seal around the bottom of the board while supplying heat from the other side. Thanks for the video Richard!

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

Oh, I clearly misunderstood that 🥴 Actually I found it really awkward to do it at all

[@gt5713]

Another technique is to use an air compressor with a triggered nozzle. Melt the solder and blow a blast of compressed air at the hole. Works well, but leaves a mess; probably not good for regular use, but reliably does the trick if you have a problematic component that you can't easily remove with other tools. Just be careful to check/remove the blown solder.

[@Lightrunner.]

Calm in worktime and temperature is essential to desolder parts. The desolder tools are one of the part to do the work but the workers skills are more important. Good Video 👌🖖👌. Live long and prosper.

[@Ratchet_effect]

True! 🖖

[@ChadLuciano]

it's painful to see people struggle when working...this is a great video showing wasted money, wasted time, further damage , all things that can be avoided by new comers to the trade/hobby...thanks for your hard work

[@mal6232]

A 10mm length of model glow engine fuel tube (silicone tube) over the end of your manual desolder pump nozzle helps sealing the pump sucking action to just the hole you are trying to desolder, improving the results immeasurably.

[@will_doherty]

A bigger issue he has is not holding the nozzle perpendicular to the hole, or even close to the hole on many occasions. They need quick exchange between the iron to melt the solder and then the sucker to remove it - and a hot iron too. I have silicone tube on mine - it helps a lot, and saves the nozzle too - though I do fit it holds lumps of solder and drops them all over the place if one isn't careful. I had to stop watching after about 15 minutes, as he seems to be deliberately failing, and I couldn't watch further...

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

@@will_doherty I'm not deliberately failing, I clearly never developed the correct technique with the manual solder suckers. I put this down to learning to use them (or not, it seems) back in the 70s and 80s when there was no way to learn this stuff apart from books and magazines and no one else at school then 6th form college was interested in this stuff. By the time things like the internet came along I had already long since moved to using vacuum desoldering stations and braid which is what we used at the repair companies I worked for. I was also using hot air guns to aid desoldering though those were the 'paint stripper' kind, like a big powerful hairdryer really. But that's how it was back in the day, if you are old enough you will remember. You guys know I have a real dislike for those solder suckers, but I will freely accept it is a (lack of) technique thing if that is the case.

[@gordthor5351]

Everything works well on easy to desolder boards. Motherboards tend to be very difficult with those tiny pads that don't conduct much heat and are often surrounded by large planes that suck up the heat. Basically, Mobos are MoFos when it comes to desoldering. :) No matter what technique, hot air assistance is your friend on such boards.

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

Which is why I chose the motherboard as the test case. No point learning the easy stuff, if you learn to do this on multilayer boards then anything will be child's play

[@gordthor5351]

@@LearnElectronicsRepair I figured that is why you choose a motherboard. I agree with your methods to desolder on difficult boards.

[@marcellipovsky8222]

It would be interesting to see the same de-soldering test but while using a proper solder with low melting point (aka Lowmelt solder). The biggest "problem" here was that there were large planes which sucked up the heat away. But also you have to think of this as the "worst case scenario" as others have pointed out mentioning that this is a multi-layer motherboard and not a thin single-layer one.

[@MrArpSolina]

You should try the Hakko FR-301 desoldering gun

[@MrArpSolina]

@Mr Guru I don't have one, sorry. Why do you want me to buy everything? I don't understand.

[@MrArpSolina]

@Mr Guru But a lot of KZbinr received some equipement from manufacturers or decide to purchase it to help and inform viewers. It was just a suggestion, in case he didn't know this device, and wanted to acquire it. Peace man!

[@ElTelBaby]

@ 22:07 I'm sure the pump would work way better if the pump tip was held vertical;... ie: the tip flat against the circuit board...

[@Evhen_Velikiy]

Normal desoldering method from my younger days till today is a soldering iron + toothpick. Its cant be simpler than just stick a toothpick into a hole to displace solder. Yes, there excess solder left, but the hole is clear now. That solder-sucker is good when desoldering ICs with many pins, not for any other component.

[@neilritchiecaguioa8593]

The desoldering iron sucker,You will need to apply or add fresh solder lead first so that the old solder on the whole will change it's consistency,It will be less creamier,Then it will be easy to suck

[@gregwmanning]

My desoldering sucking device came with needles to clean the desoldering tool.

[@staminaman77]

I found them cheap heated solder suckers are rubbish, I think if you were in desperate times desperate measures a good idea to actually get some use out of it would be to flux up the pins and use low melt solder to tin the legs then use the heated solder sucker. Not practical to always use low melt solder but it depends how much you're struggling. I am glad i'm not the only one who struggles with de-soldering components. I get to the same stage whereby i can suck up the top layer of solder but there is still none molten solder still remaining in the hole itself.

[@Dutch_off_grid_homesteading]

Heya, oh a follow up from the other video. I thiink you made your point in this video that even with the component still in the hole it still doesn't work well

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

Yeah pretty much. Though the blue desoldering iron plus hot air worked quite well with the component in place

[@davidhawley1132]

You're also sucking solder off the iron, across and into the hole. Some solder is needed on the iton to make thermal contact, but not too much.

[@robtitheridge9708]

I think all of these would work well on single layer pcbs . But with multilayer boards most do not have the power to melt the solder even worse with a big ground plane . i used to have a weller desoldering station but the spares got so expensive that i now have one simulare to yours that works well . I still think i can unsoler say a 70 pin inline chip quicker with brade. I have a friend who swears by hollow needles for componenets who,s legs are small enough for the needles to fit over..

[@knightwar3]

Also one of the most important tool for desoldering is a pcb holder!

[@peddersoldchap]

I have the 40W electric solder-sucker and it's a God sent! But I have the €10 blue version, which is different from yours.

[@naird1064]

How to desolder xbox joysticks i tried with wick and a sucker pump but no luck the solder still sticks

[@jeanious2009]

Hakko 808 desolder pump, best 250.00 USD I’ve spent when it comes down to desoldering.

[@colinmalcolm1211]

Instead of using the iron. I always find it best to just use the hot air gun and the solder pump. Obviously adding fresh solder and flux beforehand

[@ricksampson6780]

I believe you have covered this subject in a previous video.

[@will_doherty]

Would be helpful if you watched at least some of the video before commenting...

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

I believe you are slightly mistaken, as I explained at the start of this video I made a recent video using these tools (plus desoldering needles) to clear the holes from a motherboard after I had manually removed the capacitors. In the many comments to that video kzbin.info/www/bejne/e6Cvkmybl8-qfbc a number of viewers said it was an unfair comparison as at least two of these tools are designed for desoldering with the component in place, and use the component leg itself to transfer the heat through to the other side of the PCB allowing the component to be desoldered. Using them to clear the holes afterwards is an incorrect use, they said. Personally I usually find it easier to desolder and remove the component first, then clean the holes. But that does not mean I am right and others are wrong, so in this video I used the same tools, apart from desoldering needles which are not appropriate for this method, too desolder the component in place and test whether those viewers were correct in their comments. The results were, well, interesting.

[@ricksampson6780]

@@LearnElectronicsRepair Thanks for the most detailed reply.

[@mikejones8716]

Hey bud, been watching your channel for some time now and u r damn good at the repairs, but, was wondering if u r using any kind of component cataloging system to see if u have parts u need in your inventory?

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

Yeah I do have a system and I did show it on one of the videos, but didn't specifically mention that in the title. I could do a more specific one for that

[@mikejones8716]

@@LearnElectronicsRepair i was actually designing my own web based inventory systm and was looking for some input on what kind of aspects would be nice to see for different types of components

[@mikejones8716]

I was wondering if we could collab on a completely custom system?

[@knightwar3]

The failed ones work better on a single layer board i've tried the same desoldering pump that you've shown here and it did the job but imo a desoldering gun is the way to go for desoldering through hole components especially those chips with multiple legs, i wish you could've tested the desoldering gun on those large inductor legs they were just right next to those capacitors lol because i know that the other tools will fail

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

Well I could make another video about unsoldering the throughole inductors, I know the method I use and it could be fun to try some others. Fortunately those inductors hardly ever fail (like I never saw a faulty one apart from physically broken ones) and there are far easier methods to find a faulty phase in a VRM than removing the inductor

[@knightwar3]

Thank you very much that will be a great video to watch for sure and yes you're right those coils are fail proof the only ones that failed on me are the axial inductors

[@dirkgiglot912]

Is that a soldering iron or a pad remover?

[@StillakidThe]

I've muddled through for decades until I watched this. kzbin.info/www/bejne/jKDYY6uif9Copbc A game changer for part removal & using solder wick.

[@nutgone100]

Absolutely agreed!

[@ElTelBaby]

@ 7:11... Surely that didn't work;... because U didn't clean;... wipe soldering iron tip prior 2 using the pump after applying fresh solder... When U placed the tip;... 1 could C solder being squeezed out;... asking a lot 4 the pump 2 suck up...

[@dinf8940]

every time you run into the same problem - not enough heat. if you want to work cleanly with large thermal masses use preheater, ideally - work ON ir preheater, other than that you can put stronger elements on those tools but modifying pump is complete waste of time as it wont change anything other than increasing chance of stripping pads

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

That is exactly my thoughts and what I was trying to demonstrate. The part about modifiy the manual desoldering gun by fitting a pump is in response to a comment on the previous desoldering video where someone mentioned there was a cheap mod somewhere on KZbin that made the €5 tool perform as well as a €200 vacuum desoldering station. I disputed that as I thought it didn't have enough power to melt the solder in the first place, and it feel I proved the point rather well.

[@RickL_was_here]

Those manual pumps are junk. Much better off using wick if you don't have the vacuum pump.

[@deker0954]

I end up using many things.

[@WN8HGZ]

Nicely done

[@donmittlestaedt1117]

That was frustrating!

[@LearnElectronicsRepair]

Yeah that's the point. A lot of videos show these tools on easy PCBs or by very selective editing. I'm trying to show how it really is

[@donmittlestaedt1117]

@@LearnElectronicsRepair I doff my hat to you. I haven't the patience to deal with all the guff a creator takes from their viewers.

[@CXensation]

Try using a preheater pan under the PCB. A salvaged coffee machine pan would reach like 200degC. Motherboards are in effect large heatsinks and you have to counteract that in some way during the desoldering process. On top of preheating you may even have to desolder and resolder with low melt solder a couple of times to succeed. It takes trial and experience to do the job not damaging the PCB ...

[@CXensation]

@Mr Guru Yeah - I know it's the season for romance of flies

[@CXensation]

@Mr Guru How are heating up to the warping point related to soldering ?

[@axslinger99]

Solder-suckers are the LAST tool to use! You can't be serious?

[@axslinger99]

I appreciate your videos otherwise I wouldn't be here. I just want to say. your method of removing electroclytic or any capacitor is not optimal! Yes, you can melt one end, yank on it then melt the other end. Every time you tug on a device, you're stressing the PCB traces. I suction-based desoldering iron would make much more sense, set at the correct heat. You melt the solder, suck it up and pull the iron away. A simple process. If it happens to, "stick" a bit, you simply break it loose with a probe of some sort, like a screwdriver. It will, "click" when the the joint breaks and you're good to go.

[@GharacDurac]

chinese descriptions are crap :D These needles are meant to use it with a desoldering tool to clean the nozzles of them and not to clean the holes of a pcb.

[@hernancoronel]

If you look around youtube you will find some videos showing how they do it. I saw one that was in english with french accent, he heats the joint then inserts the needle around the leg of the component and since the needle is stainless steel the solder won’t stick. Then removes the needle and the leg is free, you can do the same with the second leg (and he does it in the video) but at this point you don’t even need the needle if it is a two legged component. Hope this helps!