I was ready to shit on this but I could definetely see some uses when there are a lot of through hole pins. I'd be a little worried about keeping the heat distribution even though.
this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2023
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I thought it might be useful to move the iron back and forth a little for long rows. Wouldn't be perfectly even but would be better than concentrating heat in the center.
Well the copper should disperse the heat fairly quickly. It should be okay.
this only works well if you have good soldermask in place
I picked up a Hakko desoldering gun many years ago to save me from this. It was pricey (~$300), but has been worth it over the years.
This trick might be more useful for people who are budget constrained. In the past I've resorted to cutting the plastic between the headers (making them unusable), so this is a nice alternative without the need for another tool. If budget wasn't an issue I'd likely buy a much nicer iron and an extra wide knife-style tip.
Haha, I've done that too. However sometimes it rips the pads off or otherwise damages the vias. So instead I cut them along the other axis (parallel to the PCB), then remove the remaining nibs.
These days I mostly use a hot air rework station though. In my city this is integrated with many soldering stations on the market, for maybe an extra 10$. I think mine is Yihua brand, it's quite OK.