Reddit mentions of AOYUE 936 Soldering Station

I have this one and it's served me well for the last few years. There's also an analog version. The digital ones only read in Celsius, if that bothers you. They definitely aren't as nice as a Hakko or a Weller, but it has never let me down.

As far as the fumes go, it isn't the lead that's the problem, it's the flux inside the solder. Lead doesn't vaporize until ~1700C, which your iron is never going to reach. I mention this so you know that lead free solder doesn't solve the problem.

You should either solder in a well ventilated area, or use a fume extractor. Commercial fume extractors are expensive, and you can make your own with fan and a carbon filter (you can get them for normal air filters and cut to size).

The Weller station should work just fine for you. I have the Aoyue 936 and really love it. It also comes with a spare heating element should the pre-installed one go bad. It also has temperature control rather than wattage control, which I like.

Honestly, I'd get a cheap solid chinese one off amazon, with a proper stand. The SEEED has a bit of an issue staying up to temp.

I've had one of these for a few years, and it's been pretty decent. Half the price, more options, and a much better stand.

A portable iron has more problems than it solves, usually. A nice station is almost always better.

I'm learning soldering myself and have this kit. It has served me well and is adjustable, which my more experienced colleagues assure me that was a good decision. 3 months and no issues (:

I have been using this solder and I bought this Aoyue soldering station both because they were cheap and I just started myself

Trust me when I say: variable temperature makes a big difference. I have a knockoff of the Hakko 936. The closest thing on amazon.ca is this Aoyue, which I've heard good things about. You don't need hot air as a beginner (or even for most surface mount work), so don't go to the top of the line. You can get cheap rosin core solder to get started. FYI, every set of helping hands like these I have ever owned have been absolute garbage. The vise suggested by /u/rykki will be dramatically more useful, even though it will cost more. (But it might also have applications outside of soldering.)

https://smile.amazon.com/Aoyue-AO936-AOYUE-Soldering-Station/dp/B000VINMRO/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1502298204&sr=8-3&keywords=aoyue+soldering+iron

I have a $40 AOYUE 40ish watt adjustable soldering station (it's a clone of the hakko old 936) I got from Amazon, then added a real hakko 1/16" chisel tip. These have been reviewed by a bunch of people including EEVBlog and Big Clive on YouTube. They are solid and inexpensive. They are Chinese, so if you ebay or aliexpress etc around you'll find identical ones under other brands. There's also now several slight variations, like digital control etc with very similar looks and naming (937 are the digital for example). All the variations have the same soldering iron. They take genuine hakko tips, and since chisel tips are better than thin pointy "pen" type tips for our usage, I went ahead and just got a real tip. Had this for like 3 years and it's never let me down.

Plus you can find them as low as $19+shipping from some places.

https://www.amazon.com/Aoyue-AO936-AOYUE-Soldering-Station/dp/B000VINMRO

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004OR9BV4/ref=mp_s_a_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1495002165&sr=8-4&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=hakko+chisel+tip&dpPl=1&dpID=41bjcAF3UYL&ref=plSrch

Hey, I'm looking into picking up my own soldering kit and desolder pump.
I need it to have a fine tip as I will be working with really small pcbs outside of keebs and I need a desoldering pump as I will be modifying some old gamecube controllers.

I've been reccomended https://www.amazon.com/Aoyue-AO936-AOYUE-Soldering-Station/dp/B000VINMRO and https://www.amazon.com/10pcs-Solder-Soldering-Iron-Tip-for-Hakko-Station-900M-933-907-936/dp/B00GZGLQW4/ as a kit + tips, is this good and what desoldering pump should I pick up?

TL;DR: What soldering kit with fine tip + desolder pump for small jobs?

I'm hesitant to go against the grain on this one but I've had good luck with this. They also make an analog version.

The first one you pointed to provides a constant wattage setting, what you want is a constant temperature soldering station/iron, so that's not what you should look for. (its better to just get a "dumb" 25 watt iron instead at that point)

When I said Weller or Hakko I meant the robust WES51 or the FX888, but if those are outside of your price range, thats fine, the ubiquitous Hakko 936 has a ton of clones which are very cheap and some of them do actually have decent quality (see video discussing the topic, you might also want to google "936,"
936 clone," "936d," etc for more info).

I personally know some factory people due to my line of work and there seem to be 2 noteworthy brands of clone manufacturer, Aoyue and YiHua, Aoyue is the more premium brand and YiHua is the mass produced brand, apparently both are commonly used by factory workers and they are quite good because factory workers also need good equipment due to the nature of their trade.

I would look for a Aoyue 936 clone if I were you, just get this or this if you must use amazon, or search "aoyue" in fleabay.

Is the Aoyue soldering iron any good?

I'm thinking of getting the Aoyue 936 for my first soldering iron since it's cheaper compared to the FX 888D and I don't think I'll do many soldering jobs to justify the price tag.

I know Hakko and Weller are the recommend brands for a good soldering iron, but they just cost too much.

Best value soldering iron is probably this. It's a clone of a more famous model that works very well, and should serve you for anything you need until you need a reflow oven or hot air station.

I would recommend this one (Aoyue 936, $45). I have it and am really happy with it. Heats up nice and quick, and adjustable, it's all steel and durable plastic, looks and feels nice. And you can buy 10 tips for like 5 bucks if you want.

Aoyue 936
I use this and love it. Super solid and excellent customer service.

This is a clone of the hako 936. I've had one (not this same brand, mine is yuiha) for going on 5 years now. I also have a few weller soldering stations and I will be completley honest, my 936 clone runs just as well as the wellers for my hobby use. I've now given 8 of them as gifts and have not had a single one go bad.

This was my first time attempting to solder on a PCB. If you are looking to get started with DIY builds I would recommend this kit. The instructions are in color with easy to follow steps. Coming from zero experience this was a huge help for me.

Tools Used:

Soldering gun

60/40 no clean flux core solder

Scotch tape

I didnt take pictures of every step. The board was pretty easy to build. I used tape to hold components in place. This was my first attempt at soldering anything on circuit boards but lots of guides on YouTube show you how to do it.

Specs on the psu and board.

100-240vAC Mains AC Input

Expandable - You can daisy chain up to 5

10,000mA Symmetrical Current Capacity

5,000mA Max Load +5v & +12v combined

5,000mA Max Load -12v rail

1,000mA Max Load Per Bus Board +5v rail

15 Power Outlets Per Bus Board

User Replaceable Power Bricks

The kit comes with power bricks and a 4HP module if you want to feed it nicely out through your rack. I screwed this module up so I am not using it. Lesson learned though - Place LED's between both circuit boards before soldering to ensure proper fit. You can buy everything a-la-carte which is what I did for the second busboard.

This article recommends a Hakko 936 for about $80:

• http://mbientlab.com/content/build-great-lab-hardware-startup-or-your-personal-use
  
  This looks similar for $45:
  
  
• http://www.amazon.com/Aoyue-936-AOYUE-Soldering-Station/dp/B000VINMRO/
  
  Does anyone own either one of these?
  

Aoyue makes a lot of decent cheap stations that can take standard Hakko tips.

I have one of these Aoyue 936 irons, which is a knock off of a Hakko model. It has worked well, and the Hakko tips fit it.

But you can get even cheaper temperature controlled irons if you look around. I've seen used 40W Wellers go on ebay for ~$15.

I've been using my Aoyue 936 for a few years now. Heats up quickly, and uses Hakko tips.

Fairly light usage, but it's worked well for me, and hard to beat for $36.

If affordable really means affordable, what about https://www.amazon.com/Aoyue-AO936-AOYUE-Soldering-Station/dp/B000VINMRO

Don't even think about getting a non-temperature controller iron. They get way too hot and destroy your tip, making it impossible to get proper heat transfer. Weller makes some good irons, but that $40 one you linked is not at all one of them. That $100 Hakko is very nice, as are the knockoffs of their older models, like this $60 937+ and this $33 936.

At the low end, I got this $18 soldering kit for my travel bag recently, the tweezers, stand and solder sucker are extremely cheap, but the iron is almost as good as my station. Swap the cone tip out for the small chisel tip they send, get a brass sponge to clean your tip, and you're good to go.