Soldering Iron Recomendation / Pros and Cons

I have Hakko and Weller at work and I don’t rate them. I was really disappointed I didn’t like the Hakko. They are OK for single component jobs, or making up plugs etc. The modern weller certainly wasn’t worth the extra over the Hakko. In fact the most popular soldering iron at work is a very basic weller from the 1980’s.

At home I have a Pace MBT250. It’s not fast to heat up, and takes up a lot of valuable bench space, but there is nothing I can’t do with it, and I love the desoldering tool for repair work. I picked it up brand new on eBay for a bargain price and have never looked back. I used to use a Xytronix (sp?) that was good but had limited tips.

The dremel seems to be the best of a bad bunch as far as gas soldering irons go. I used to like the weller gas irons but had a couple of poor ones.