Travel soldering iron

Phil hodson

Well-known member
Hello all!

I’m looking for a bit of advice.
Due to the current world situation I have to isolate for around 4 days every other month in a hotel.
I was thinking today what a waste it is of valuable time. Apart from making massive components orders etc. And playing my travel guitar which is actually the nice part.
I am finding less time for building. So I wondered if it would be a good idea to take a few boards away with me and fit all the resistors, sockets and other small misc parts. I wouldn’t travel with IC’s etc. I could do them later. This would free up some time when I’m home for adding the good parts, oh and more family time too 🤣
I could take a small collection of tools to help. I Wouldn’t need much.
I wonder though if there is a good quality soldering iron that is also easy to travel with. I don’t need the solder station style. Something small and compact but hot enough and good quality.
Or am I living in a dream and all this will be over soon????
Any thoughts and recommendations much appreciated as always.
Thanks in advance,,,
 
Hi guys. Thanks for the reply. Is it the UY Chan one?
Miniware is the brand name.


It's very possible that there are knockoff versions, which may or may not be as good as the original. I bought mine on eBay from a local seller that had good feedback.
 
The ts-100 is technically open source hardware so there are a handful of brands making it. The one I have is UY Chan but has all of the same branding as the miniware ones.

Either way, @Phil hodson that one looks good. You might want to buy a separate power supply instead of a kit with one, the power supply that came with mine was short and I ended up just using an old laptop power supply I had laying around.
 
Perfect. That’s what I thought. They look the same.
Shipping would be better with Amazon too.
Will look into a separate power supply. I did hear that it was short 🤣 seems pointless.
Is the BC2 tip better for small pcbs?
 
I got mine without a power supply because I have access to a large pile of e-waste and simply searched through it till I found a laptop power supply that was in spec. Works perfectly and cost nothing.
 
That’s what I saw as well @Barry. One on Amazon has over 1k good reviews so I think I will give that a shot. As long as it’s good for resistors and sockets etc that should both pass and save some time!

Hope you find it as good as I find mine! If you want true portability there's a lot of ways people have powered it from battery packs. Also the replacement firmware is worth the 30 seconds it takes to install it, even if you don't use any of the new features other than just changing settings easier: https://github.com/aWZHY0yQH81uOYvH/ts100
 
I hope so too. It looks great to me. I don’t think I will go to the extremes of battery packs as hopefully will be doing it in hotel rooms with power. Just maybe need a longer lead.
Will look up that firmware too. Thanks for the tip!
What sort of temp do you run yours at for components?
 
What sort of temp do you run yours at for components?
Everyone is different because it's all based on feel IMO. I tend to run mine between 375C and 400C with a maximum of 3 seconds touching the board/component. I've got a cheap chinese one so I don't trust the temperature knob 100%The hotter it is the better the solder can melt quickly, but run the risk of frying the components in the process.
 
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