I spent 9 hours building a turnout today, two of which were trying to get my soldering iron to work. It’s an X-tronic 4000 Series, 4010-XR3 to be exact. That’s it right there on my dining room table.
I could not get it to melt solder. I stuck the tip in flux, wiped it on a paper towl, used the blue sponge–nothing worked. I even took steel wool to it–and I finally got it to melt solder. But it was a cold joint.
Finally, I went and got my 15 year-old RS 40W pencil and it worked about like it did before. I had tinned the tip.
The X-tronic didn’t take to tin.
After I got the turnout to the point where I didn’t think there was anything to make a loco derail–we"ll see about that , right? I got out the X-tronic and took a file to it. Then I polished as best I could with the steel wool. And you know what?
It actually worked better than the Radio Shack. At least in terms of how fast it melted solder.
So, what should I be doing to take care of my tip? I mean, besides taking a file to it.
I need a new tip. What should I get?
And while I’m asking questions, how do I know whether to increase the heat or whether to decrease it.
And don’t ever file the tip. You have likely now filed the plating off and while it may have worked for now, it will now quickly oxidize. At this point you should get a new tip. The tip should be shiny and bright. If it is dull and blackened - it’s not going to melt solder very well.
Since it is adjustable - one thing to do is NOT turn it up as high as it goes - it is very rare that anything, including soldering track joints, in model railroading would need the max temp the station is capable of. The lowest settings are below the melting point of solder.
As wvg_ca says, when you are done ussing it, you should melt a blob of solder on the tip and then turn it off. Next time you use it, once it heats up to melt that blob, wipe it off and you should have a nice shiny tip. You can also use a tip tinner, generally sal ammoniac, it comes in a little cannister, mine had a piece of double sided tape on it so I stuck it right on my station. Don;t overuse it - it eventually eats the plating off the tip, but once in each session, to get the tip clean, and then immediately add some solder to truly tin it.
Also get yourself something like this, it works much better than a damp sponge:
First, you want a minimum of two tips: A chisel tip and a pointed tip. The chiesel tip is great for maximizing the heat transfer from your soldering iron to your track. Will your Xytronic soldering station accept other manufacturers soldering tips - e.g. Weller or Hakko?
Secondly, never…NEVER file, sand, or use any type of abrasive on the plating of your soldering tip to clean it. A good tip is one that remains shiny. If it’s dull and won’t tin and/or the plating is gone then it’s time for a new tip. The suggestion of melting a glob of solder on the tip before shutting your soldering iron down is a good one. This will keep the tip from oxidizing when cold. I do this even if I’m going to shut down my soldering station for only 5 min.
I would also suggest using the coiled brass “sponges” for cleaning your tips rather than the damp sponge method. Regular sponges deteriorate and leave debris. The brass sponges look like spiral wads of brass ribbon wadded into a ball. The brass is softer than the plating on the solder tip. I’ve been using the same chisel soldering on my Weller soldering station for years and it’s STILL shiny.
For soldering decoders I keep the tip between 650-700oF. For track you’ll want to go higher - like 750oF. It depends on how much surface you’re trying to heat up.
Lastly, I would suggest getting a small jar of rosin soldering flux. Your solder probably already has the rosin flux in it but I still like add a small toothpick dab of it on the area to be soldered to get that shiny solder joint when it’s cool. I have a 2 oz jar that I picked up at Radio Shack years ago and I’ve hardly made a dent in it.
Bottom line: Shiny soldering tip…shiny solder joints. The former will always keep you from achieving t
I felt I didn’t have anything to loose. I ordered the tips, tinner, the brillo in a can, some .8mm solder and some flux. I’ll use the RS 40W until the stuff arrives Thurs.
I tin my tips. That’s why the RS worked after a two year hiatus. I can’t imagine not doing it on the X-tronic.
I am still completely lost at what tempurature to use. It will go from smoking paper to burning through brass. Searching the internet, asking on this forum doesn’t net me a glimmer of a starting point.
The best advice I got was to pick an number and fiddle with it. I picked 785F. It worked before but not today. I turned it up to 872F with no effect, until I filed it. So its now 872F. Is that in the ballpark?
What criteria do you use for going up or down?
I’m going to have to do a lot of soldering in this hobby and I feel like I’m spinning my wheels. I watch videos of people touching irons to itty bitty electronic things and I have no idea of how to get from here to there.
I just ordered Hakko 10 points, so it better. (They say it’ll work on mine.)
Which is why I didn’t worry about filing it. I knew I was going to order new tips. And I know about tinning. Like I said above, I can’t believe I didn’t tin the X-tronics.
Double check the tip to make sure it’s tight. They can loosen up due to the heating and cooling cycle. When they do, the results are much like you describe above, highern settings seem to produce limited or no reults
Get good flux. And I don’t mean the GERN kind: good non-acid ‘no-clean’ flux. Use it regularly, use it a lot. The most important part of soldering is good flux.
The ‘plating’ on a tip is more circumstantial than actually valuable: a plain copper tip properly cleaned, fluxed and tinned will transfer heat cleanly to the joint as well as any nominally ‘nonstick’ plating. Just be prepared to be religious with FLUXING and then tinning and then cleaning your tip whenever you are starting and then whenever you are ending a session.
The special tip tinner is useful but it is not a full substitute for proper technique. Think of it as solder paste for a slightly more specialized use – and don’t stint on either the fluxing and the tip cleaning.
And get a bronze wool sponge for cleaning. Use it frequently. I don’t like these made of wire wool; get one made with coarse lathe turnings or equivalent to give them edges and ‘tooth’ to scrape scurf off the tip…
Note that there are different types of solder,some of which are carefully formulated to melt over a very small range of temperature. The ‘correct’ tip temperature is partly determined not by how hot the iron says it is, but by how hot the iron gets the parts of the joint the flux helps the alloy stick to. This is why size and shape of tip sometimes matter – and why the alloy and temperature range of what you tin the tip on a particular job should be picked carefully rather than thinking the difference is merely ‘rosin core’ vs. ‘acid core’ as picked up at Lowe’s.
I know cost is an important issue for you, but since you have a reasonably good iron you should invest in good no-clean flux, a bronze sponge, perhaps a couple of different tips made for the station that you treat properly … and several different compositions of solder with diffe
Hey, Chip, Do us a fave and let us know if those Hakko tips do in fact work on the Xtronic station? I got the same Xtronic that you have. I haven’t had any trouble with it, but I recon the day will come I need Tips…
I’ll say this much. This variable temp soldering station took the extreme frustration and hatred out of soldering for me. Dan
i’ve found that the tip may not be making good contact with the rest of the soldering iron. spinning it, in your case, may help.
you filing the tip probably moved it around and that helped it.
i’ll hold a soldering tip up near my lips to sense how hot it is. if it looks dirty, i’ll spit on a paper towel and wipe it clean. don’t usually have to do it twice.
if there’s solder accumlating on the tip, i’ll just shake it off. i’ve learned not to bang the soldering tip against anything because it can dislodge the thin wire in the shaft of some soldering irons used to heat it.
i’d rather keep my bench space free of unnecessary things like a water bottle or solder cleaner. i keep a solder sucker handy
One more item to add, Chip: A bottle of 91% isopropyl/rubbing alcohol for cleaning rosin flux from boards, wires, and/or track. That you can pick up from your local pharmacy or order it from Amazon. I also have a bottle of 99% isoproply handy for the same purpose.
I prefer 63/37 solder - it DOES make a difference. 63/37 is eutectic - it all melts and freezes together, 60/40 is not, so there is a greater chance of making a cold joint.
800+ degrees is way too hot. My station is an old style with an analog knob, no digital readout, but I think the markings are calibrated (somewhat) in degrees celcius. I usually use around 400C, which is around 750F. Somewhat lower for fine wires like decoders, or small electronics. More like 650-700F for that. With a knob, it’s also easy to flip down to the lowest setting if you need to do some work between soldering - it heats up rapidly, so it’s not a loss of time, and the cooler you keep the tip, the less is oxidizes. I don;t turn it down if I am just setting it in the stand so I can place another component, but if I am setting the iron down so I can move things around, clip off excess leads, etc - a few minutes or more of work until I need to solder again, then I will turn it down.
The main thing to know is that good soldering is an acquired art, not a necessary evil. Practice on scrap material first with the wedge tip and fine point tip.
I have used a Weller WLC-100 station in the past with Radio Shack tip cleaner and damp sponge. Plated tips.
Cardas Quad Eutectic silver solder. Goes from liquid to solid faster than any other solder. I got it from Amazon. No extra temp on station.
Both are on the way. I’m going to be doing a lot of soldering in the near future. It will be a good investment.
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Note that there are different types of solder,some of which are carefully formulated to melt over a very small range of temperature. The ‘correct’ tip temperature is partly determined not by how hot the i
