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mike mike is offline
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Default solder won't come out of hole

On 7/17/2012 1:05 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
On Tue, 17 Jul 2012 15:53:01 -0400, "Tom Del Rosso"
wrote:

For the past couple of hours I've been trying to get the solder out of a
hole. It's a mobo cap, and the other hole sucked right out. It's like an
obstruction. The solder melts with difficulty, but even then I can't get a
dental pick as deep as in the other hole. The cap pulled out easily on both
leads.


Probably a multilayer board with a big ground plane acting as a heat
sink.

You left out the MOST IMPORTANT first step!!!
Wear eye protection!!!
Compressed air and molten solder is a recipe for blindness!!

Find some compressed air and a cardboard box.
Get the solder melted with a soldering iron. Use flux.
Point the back side of the PCB towards the cardboard box.
Heat the back side of the PCB with the soldering iron.
Apply the compressed air nozzle to the circuit side.
Remove the soldering iron and very quickly blow some compressed air
through the hold. The dross should land inside the cardboard box.

Also, pointed dental picks don't work well because there's too much
room for the solder in the hole with the tapered tip. Use a paper
clip or stainless piece of wire instead.