[TriEmbed] PCB Carolina soldering workshop

[Mike Lisanke]

Pete,

Thanks for your comments. I'm always evaluating the costs of experience and
found it difficult to justify $130/4-hrs regardless of competency.

On Tue, Oct 25, 2016 at 6:07 PM, Pete Soper via TriEmbed <
triembed at triembed.org> wrote:

> My picture being on the web page for last year's workshop kind of implied
> I might recommend it. Multiple folks have asked me about this, so here are
> a few notes that might help with the decision of dropping $130 for a few
> hours of instruction and practice with premo equipment.
>
> The executive summary is that if you want to learn from an extremely
> experienced instructor and use one of the best soldering systems on the
> planet together with a very good microscope, practice board and component
> set you can take home to continue with, then I recommend it. If you expect
> some miraculous effect on your skills or more than a bit of personal
> instruction you may be disappointed. IMO this would be a frustrating waste
> of money for a beginner, and the 30% inflation over last year is
> unfortunate. I wanted to get more details from the organizers to pass
> along, but can only share the hope that there are changes to the event this
> year that balance the extra cost.
>
> This workshop caught me last year at a good time to get some calibration
> points for technique, tools and supplies.  I started soldering in the late
> 50s when my dad helped me build things like tube radios in coffee cans. Dad
> was part of an IBM team building and maintaining one of the Sage computer
> systems. But, apart from one job where I provided custom test firmware to
> the "board bring up" techs in the company manufacturing facility, I'd had
> no contact with people who make a living judging good vs bad soldering. And
> I just thought I knew what a nice soldering iron was like.
>
> Angel, the instructor,  provided some excellent instruction last year,
> with demonstration of techniques clearly shown via his microscope camera.
> He went into detail about solder and flux and his info enabled me to make a
> smooth, one way transition to SAC 305 lead free solder for my hand
> soldering. (I'm still using lead paste for reflow work). Angel also covered
> enough standards details to give appreciation for the benefit of additional
> instruction should I get into a position where the expense is justified. I
> spent a few hours after the workshop finishing the practice board at home.
> The workshop and additional practice enabled me to reach a point where I
> don't fret at all about hand soldering fine pitch packages and I can
> reliably end up with neat results from assembly and rework with no extra
> stomach acid production. A few months after the workshop I bought a Weller
> WX like the one used there. I haven't had a second's remorse and this
> genuinely boosted my productivity. It's extremely unlikely I could have
> been convinced this tool would be worth the money if I hadn't used one
> seriously for a few hours. I had been using Gene Kahn's Nikon SMZ-U, but
> recently got an Amscope SM4-TPZ microscope and again, experience from the
> workshop served as a benchmark for the performance level I knew would let
> me get good results with challenging jobs.
>
> The show page with a link to the workshop can be found here
> <http://www.pcbcarolina.com/>.
>
> -Pete
>
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>


-- 
Best regards,  Mike
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