Cold Heat soldering iron.... does it work? (1 Viewer)

[Dave Poehlman]

Time for me to start another infomercial thread...


You've seen it on TV... the cordless soldering iron that heats up and cools down in seconds.

Anyone use it? Does it work?

 

[Tim Hoover]

I'm also intrigued by this, Dave, but I've never used one nor seen one in action. Now they just need to put a splash-guard on that sucker and I can go solder-burn free for the rest of my life

 

[Mike Slade]

Haven't used one myself but I read a review of it awhile back and the writer said it was one of the few times where something actually worked as advertised on tv

 

[Jim_F]

It's been summarily dismissed by the posters in the pinball group which I read. They find it no good for most solder jobs, useless for circuit boards, and cheaply built (several reports of the tip breaking off within the first day)
I still considered buying one because it looked small and wanted something cordless. I ended up buying a Radio Shack butane soldering iron. The price was lower, it's smaller than the CH and it works pretty good for the kind of beginner level jobs which I attempt.

 

[BrianW]

I got one, and I like it. It's not great for circuit boards with tiny pads, but it will do the job. I got it mostly because it was on sale ($10), but also because I needed to run security wiring and had many joints to solder around windows, doors, and ceiling fixtures. The unit's portability and instant usability (no heat-up time) made my wiring job a snap -- much easier and a lot faster than it would have been with a wired iron.

One thing you should know: The tips are expendable, meaning that they deteriorate a little bit with each use. The tips are a little fragile, but with care, they should be good for 100 to 200 joints. Extra tips are available on the Internet.

 

[Mark Giles]

On a side note, I remember using a regular solder iron for the first time about 3 years ago. I didn’t let the iron heat up to it’s maximum heat so, at one time, I had trouble with the solder melting. I went to put some pressure on the iron by pushing down on the grip part of the handle with my thumb. Due to the delay of the nerve signals to my brain, it wasn’t until about 3 seconds later that I realized my thumb was on the metal of the 700+ degree iron. OUCH!!!!!!!!

I had an indention in my thumb for the next 3 months.

 

[Citizen87645]

Oh yeah? When I was seven years old my dad and uncle were working on something and I didn't know what a soldering iron was, so I picked it up by the hot end, unbeknownst to my elders. Talk about a brain signal delay! Not knowing the thing was hot, all I felt was something weird on my hand so I went to wash it off. Once the water touched YOWZA! I had a couple blisters from that one.

 

[Joe Szott]

My engineer friends have told me the cold heat soldering iron is ok for hard to reach or around the house light soldering. For a dedicated workbench with PCBs and such, it's mostly useless.

 

[BrianW]

So there you have it, Dave. It's good for portable, occasional use, but bad for dedicated, full-time use on circuit boards.

So what are your plans for this thing?

 

[Seth_L]

I saw one in person today for the first time. It relies on the metal object you are soldering to complete a circuit which then causes it to bacsically heat up instantly. This means it only works if you can put what you are soldering into the notch in the tip. So, it won't work for surface mount components, or certain other things.

 

[Jeff Cooper]

If I lived back in the wild west days, instead of carrying a six-gun in my holster, I'd carry a soldering iron. That way, if some smart-aleck cowboy said something like "Hey, look. He's carrying a soldering iron!" and started laughing, and everybody else started laughing, I could just say, "That's right, it's a soldering iron. The soldering iron of justice." Then everybody would get real quiet and ashamed, because they had made fun of the soldering iron of justice, and I could probably hit them up for a free drink.

 

[Jimi C]

deep thoughts jeff... very deep.

 

[Dave Poehlman]

Oh.. I dunno... I have to solder things once in a while (crossovers, cables.. etc). It'd be nice to have some instant heat.

 

[Scott L]

You want instant heat check this out!

 

[Ken CG]

It's a piece of crap!! We got one from Think Geek. The tip broke. Think Geek sent another tip. Not only did it eat batteries, but a piece of solder got stuck between the tips and it overheated and smoke started pouring out of the unit itself. This hunk of crap is going back. I managed to successfully solder ONE project and that's it. Don't waste your money on this. It's not work. Get a REAL soldering iron for less than $15 at Radio Shack.

 

[BrianW]

Ken, why didn't you just turn it off?

 

[Ken CG]

I was trying to use it! The tip wasn't getting hot, but the insides were.