what is 'flux' ?

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=flux
http://www.systranbox.com/systran/box

those links dont help me

'dip into the flux' = ?

look at the picture! it is a material to enchance the "grip" of the solder on your metal
ask in any electronic shop, they'll know what you want

ah yes i looked at the pic ,
now i know it enhances the 'grip' of the soldering
thx

soldering flux is some kind of acid. watch out for your skin and eyes!

What kind of soldering wire is recomended? Some have 60% of tin, other 80% ... Some even have 3.5% flux in them.

hi

Flux cleans the surface of a part/wire so that solder will 'wet' it (instead of beading up and coming off). Two types of flux: acid and rosin. Acid flux is great for doing plumbing, bad for electronics. Rosin flux is safer for electonics, but can conduct small amounts of current. Alway immediately clean off excess flux with isopropyl alcohol.

Rather than trying to put a small amount of flux on an IC leg, dip the tinned wire into the flux (picking up a small amount of flux), hold the wire it to the leg, and apply your iron.

Wipe your iron regularly and keep it tinned. If the tip of your iron isn't coated with a thin layer shiny molten solder, you're doing something wrong.

Most any solder will do, except acid flux cored. Lead based is the easiest to work with, but has obvious drawbacks. 80/20 tin-antimony is my favorite.

thanks for your input!

what has the soldering you have done in the article achieved

well, since the motherboard used in the article was a dead one ...
the article is aimed at giving pointers to increase your soldering skills, so you don't screw up "live" hardware


this weekend I'm going to voltmod my Abit NF7-S
http://www.madshrimps.be/forums/show...&threadid=4257

going to solder it yourself?

that's what the "I" in my phrase means...

and flux can be found where? In DIY stores as Brico/gamma/... or in more specialised shops (velleman dealers)?

I think you'll have more luck in a velleman reseller

this guide helped me a lot.

Now i'm practicing my 1337 soldering skills on some boken PCI vga cards , this evening on my 9800 pro/XT

Moeha !

Buy the spool solder with flux built in.

normal solder, no flux overhere:

Linkie to Vmod pictures

clean work, which guide are you using for the R9800 mod?

madshrimps guide duh !

hey, not bad for my first solder job huh

and ? :-)

that was almost 2 months ago, never found the time and space, have the space now, but need the time

I can solder it for you

if you pay the mobo if it brakes, sure

I can solder for sure , but never did a mod.
Its time for me to finish school and go to work so i can buy some mobos for modding

I don't have the money if something must go wrong so i wait till I work or my board doesn't have garantie

i never touch someones hardware unless i am sure what i am doing and i got the money if it die

anyway have fun voltmodding .

Today I modded my Epox 8RDA+:

http://users.pandora.be/patrick.fierens1/epox8rda+/

piotke,
There are talkers and doers; you are the doer.
I admire the latter.

Had to cut 2 lines, soler on the PCB itself, ...

Tomorrow it's time to test some watercooling

that was aimed to me? (talkers)

well anyway , I solder once in week electronic velleman components so don't think is hard for me to vmod

I just don't solder hardware , if something goes wrong with mobo or graca I loose my garantie and hardware is expensive for a student.

Was this your first Vmod or was it the your first solder job?

first solder job

dajjum that takes balls (or a well filled wallet )

:-)

I did Vmods before, but then I used SMD grabbers or glue

i just did the 3 in 1 mod but for some reason speedfan measures the same vdimm as before ( 2.96 ), i've place a 1k VR between it and it doesn't change when i adjust it

strange and the board still works

Ok, I just (finally !!) started practicing on an old (dead?) mobo

cutting traces seems to be going well, I can't' test if I damaged something by cutting to deep but the trace is cut and the surrounding lines aren't

So then, I started tinning and soldering and here I got some issues:

the solder gets sucked onto the soldering iron wich is ok cuz it's supposed to be tinned anyway but I can hardly get any on the wires.

I'm guessing this is because I'm not using flux? (Didn't have that in the electronics shop, at leatst not the rosin flux...)


and then the biggest problem: after messing around a while, I started to get "korrels" (grains in english?).
I'm guessing this is "the other substance" in the solder (not tin but ...) that gets burned because the iron gets to hot (It's a cheapo 25W big tip unregulatable).


And lastly, I need some advice on how to unsolder one of them tiny SMD's because I tried but I had to try several times on each side before it would come loose and I touched each side waaaaaay longer then 3 seconds. Also, when it finally came off - I was using a small flat screwdriver to move it wich didn't seem like a good idea but I don't know how else to get the SMD off, lifting it with the solder iron didn't work so I'll need some tips on how to do this properly aswell - it slithered to the side and I fear that if I would do this on a good board, solder may stick on some unprotected points, shorting them.



So, I'll need your advice on why I'm having these problems and how to solve them offcourse



thx in advace

can answer on the solder not sticking to wires part: get Flux.

see i dont understand that people play with external flux on grakas mobo etc...

i did mutch of soldering in my life but i never used flux,
just use the solder with the flux inside

i use super solder wire of velleman
size 60% , dia 1.0 mm
and it works pritty fine

dunno its just my thought

Just got the same advice yort

but unlike you, I didn't solder much in my life I don't have the experience, and I don't have anyone to turn to for advice on how to do it or what best to buy. Not even the local electronics store could help me with my questions...

Yes, there's the internet and I'm learning but it's going step by step with falling and getting up ...

I've done some vmods in the past, used external flux, but I'm a noob when it comes to soldering

Just checked the manufacturer's site of my solder and apparently I've already got rosin flux solder.

Don't know why it's not sticking to the solder though...
Well actually it is, a weeee little, but not enough to my liking, right now, the solder isn't even visible on between the little wires but it's there when I heat it up against a connection point cuz it sticks but I'd rather have the wires tinned to 1 wire so to speak