What is Desoldering And Why to Learn?
Desoldering is an important skill to learn in electronics because it removes components, wire, solder from a circuit board for troubleshooting, replacement, repair, and salvage.
Desoldering is an important skill to learn once you’ve gotten the hang of soldering because messing up a soldering job isn’t improbable how to desolder and understand its primary step here.
The basic concept of How to desolder is straightforward:
- Heat the solder.
- You need to figure out how to get the component or wires out nicely.
- You need to clean up all the solder still attached to the board and the part.
If you have any other desoldering methods, please comment
Tools For Desoldering? |Simple Techniques|
The most common Tools used for desoldering are;
- Heat Gun
- Chip Quik
- Soldering Iron
- Desoldering Station
- Desoldering Pump
- Compressed Air Desolder
- Desoldering Wick/Braid
The Ultimate Guide And How To Desolder With and Without Soldering Iron & Pump
In this guide, you’ll learn many of the diverse techniques of how to solder and used to desolder through-hole components, from the friendly, clean techniques to the last resort, end of the world schemes to get your desperately needed parts back.
1. How To Desolder Using Soldering Iron
If you have just a soldering iron, your only option is to heat the solder and fiddle with it until you get the components out. Here’s what you can do:
1. Heat the solder with the soldering iron tip.
2. Slide the hot iron tip up the pins to bring the majority of the solder away from the old solder joint.
3. Using tweezers or pliers, gently pull at the components, wire, or part to remove their pins from the pinholes while they are still hot. It’s good to draw by their leads instead of on the elements themselves to maintain the component’s quality.
For the soldering iron approach, it would be better to seize the LEADS of the component with the long nose pliers for two reasons:
a) pliers act as heat sinks, so one does not destroy the device.
b) leads have better structural integrity.
Thing We Dislike:
You may damage the board if you leave the hot soldering iron on it for a long time.
2. How To Desolder Using Desoldering Pump
Desoldering pumps come in different styles, from handheld pumps to electronic, bulb, heated guns that require no soldering iron to use. They are great for desolder old joints and reworking small parts and getting solder out of pinholes. Removed components can be reused.
One of the most excellent ways to desolder a component involves using a desoldering pump. A desoldering pump is essentially a tiny, high-pressure vacuum.
After heating the old solder, you can use the desoldering pump manual and electrical to suck the solder.
Here are the steps for using a desoldering pump:
- Heat the solder using the soldering iron you want to remove. Electrical desoldering pumps come with attached iron.
- Press down on the plunger and if your using pump has a bulb, squeeze the bulb.
- Once the solder melt, spot the desoldering pump’s tip against the weld that you need to eliminate.
- Release the plunger or bulb. It will suck the melted solder.
- Use the plier to remove the free component.
- Repeat steps 1-4 to remove molten solder.
- Dispose of the solder inside the pump by repeatedly pressing down and releasing the plunger.
If you are trying to remove excess bits of solder, you may want to add more solder to the joint because the solder will stay liquid for longer when in more giant “blobs” and thus be easier to remove.
Thing We Dislike:
Although the pumps can have small tips, they are large and may be hard to get into very tight spaces.
3. How To Desolder Using Desoldering Wick/Braid
Desoldering braid is excellent for removing old solder joints from flat surfaces. It’s cheap, easy to use, and comes in various sizes depending on the magnitude of the solder you want to remove. It is used for the removal of PCB components without any damage.
Desoldering braid, or solder wick, is a friendly desoldering method used to soak up unwanted solder essentially. As copper conducts heat well and the solder is attracted to heat, you can draw the solder off your part and into the braid by heating the braid. Some desoldering braid comes with flux, making it much easier and cleaner to remove the solder. If your soldering wick does not contain flux, dip the braid’s section into the flux and then apply.
Steps for How to desolder through desolder wick:
- Cut or Unwind a few inches of wick from the braided coil.
- If your solder braid does not have flux on it, it would be better to add flux to the section you will use to make for clean removal of solder.
- Place the braid over the joint of the component you want to desolder or rework.
- Place a hot soldering iron tip against the braid and desired pin.
- Wait a few seconds. The solder will melt and flow off the pin and absorb by the wick.
- Repeat steps 1-5 to remove excess solder.
- Remove the braid. The wick will be very hot at this point, so make sure not to touch the braid. Use needle-nose pliers to position and hold down the braid without getting burned.
- Remove the component using the long nose pliers.
Things we dislike:
Desoldering braid isn’t reusable. You’ll start with a clean segment of braid each time you use it because it absorbs the old solder and flux. It’s also pretty hard to get the solder out of pinholes.
4. How To Desolder Using Hot Air Station
A key component to complete a DIY electronics workstation, a desoldering station helps carefully remove the solder from complex and crucial boards and equipment without burning the circuitry. These stations use the principle of heating the solder and vacuum to get the job done.
Here are the steps that How to use the desoldering station for desoldering:
- Turn on the station
- Adjust the perfect temperature
- Use Soldering and hot air to melt the solder.
- Turn on the vaccum pump to suck the molten solder
- Repeat the suction process again and again to remove the solder completely
- The component can be reused and perfect in shape without any damage.
Things We Dislike: It is Expensive
5. How To Desolder Using Heat Gun
It is a quick and easy way to get a component out of a PCB without a soldering iron. Using a heat gun is another way to remove solder and pieces without a soldering iron. The details may be reused, depending on the damage done.
It heats the solder enough to melt it and can remove the components.
Here’s are the essential step for how you can use a heat gun to desolder components:
- Turn on the heat gun until the air get hot.
- Use pliers to hold the circuit board above the hot air stream.
- Use needle-nose pliers to pull the component out of the board.
What We Dislike:
It is not a suitable method for the complex circuit board. The component and the board may burn.
6. How To Desolder Using Chip Quick
Chip Quik is an alloy that has a melting point of 58°C (136°F). You can combine it with the solder already present on the solder joints creates a mixture that has a low melting point. It lowers the melting temperature of the solder and keeps it molten longer. In practice, this means you can remove SMD components with temperatures under 150°C (300°F) without the risk of overheating anything. It allows you to easily remove SMD components without damage with a soldering iron instead of with a hot air rework station.
Basic Steps:
- Apply the included flux to the leads of the SMD component.
- Use a soldering iron to melt the applied alloy on all pins of the component. Make sure to keep it in a molten state.
- Use tweezers, piler, vacuum pen, or toothpick to lift the components from the board.
- You can use desoldering braid, or even a cotton swab dipped in flux to Remove any remaining flux.
- Clean the solder pads and surrounding area thoroughly with alcohol to remove the molten solder.
Chip Quik is perfect when you need to remove significant surface mount components (like ICs) that otherwise would need a lot of continuous heat applied to keep the solder on all pins molten. It also allows you to remove SMD components with a soldering iron instead of a hot air rework station.
Conclusion:
Desoldering is a pretty tricky business, and many people have come up with their techniques to cleanly removing components from a circuit board. This guide only covered removing through-hole parts, but there are many other ways to desolder different circuits. If you have any other desoldering methods you’d like to share, please add them in the comments! Thanks.