Hi all
I am looking at a portable soldering iron and it seems there are two leading contenders - the TS80P and the HS-01. Wondering if anyone has any solid experience they can lend to help me decide
TS80P:
Cost 730 SEK (including 1 tip)
Replacement Tips: 449 SEK
Pros: Available locally, Field Box (Omnifixo - Field box by OMNIFIXO - Thingiverse)
Cons: 30W, limited range of tips - expensive tips
HS-01:
Cost: 600 SEK (including 6 tips)
Replacement Tips: 110 SEK
Pros: Cheaper initial purchase, more tips in the box; cheaper tips; higher power (65W)
Cons: Not available locally (import duties and tax; harder to get tips - need friends in the US to send); no field box
All in all, the HS-01 seems the much better choice, though it does concern me that it will be harder to get replacement tips. I have a friend visiting from the states soon, so I can get the unit from amazon.com (or the shipping isn’t too bad), but the tips are not available to ship (for some reason). I have no idea how long the tips will last though, maybe thats not such a big deal. Also, silly as it sounds, the field box of the HS-01 that I linked to is a very big plus - being able to carry the iron, some solder and solder base plate (https://omnifixo.com/) would suit my use case very well. I use the PCBite at home, and a small version for the field would be excellent! I guess the obvious solution is to remix the box to fix the HS-01 (make it a wee bit longer as the HS01 is longer) == more storage (a slight adjustment to the top so the omnifixo will still fit of course!) - whilst I’m at it, maybe add a second layer for the power bank (also attached by magnets)
I have two main use cases
- home: My workbench is in a shed where there is no permanent power; when i want to use my main solder unit I need to run an extension cable from the house. For small jobs like attaching header pins, or small, simple boards this would be my unit of choice
- “field” - although I don’t go out in field much, i often help friends with projects, so having an iron when i visit to troubleshoot / install / assemble etc would be beneficial
to be honest, neither of these two cases is likely to be common, but common enough right now to cause me some issues
if i look at it from that perspective, the HS-01 seems to be the clear winner… it’s the replacement tips that is the main concern…
I know Dave Jones at EEVBlog gave the HS-01 a good review and replaced his TS80P with it… and that’s normally good enough for me - but looking for an external verification; and if anyone thinks the lack of ease of sourcing replacement tips is likely to be an issue
First off, I want to acknowledge that delivery is delayed — probably by a month or two. There are a few reasons for this, and I want to be fully transparent. One of the biggest factors is that the funds from Crowd Supply arrived much later than expected — late February instead of early January. That delay had a cascading effect on ordering parts and kicking off production.
But I’ve been using the time to make sure the design is as solid as it can be before pulling the trigger. Thanks to a helpful comment from the community, I discovered that under certain conditions — specifically when the tip is hot-unplugged — the voltage intended for the heater could momentarily short with the thermocouple signal and stress the analog front-end IC well beyond its limits. It wasn’t something that showed up in normal use, but definitely something that could impact long-term reliability. So I decided to go through (hopefully) one final PCB design iteration to add proper protection circuitry.
One thing that’s been keeping me really busy is certification. To help navigate the regulatory maze, I got in touch with 
On the sourcing side, I ran into an obstacle with the original supplier of the plastic buttons (JLC3DP), as they weren’t able to provide the necessary RoHS and REACH documentation — which is essential for that part of CE compliance. I’ve since been reaching out to alternative suppliers who can provide proper certification. I’ve identified three promising options and am currently waiting on samples.
Meanwhile, I’ve also been improving the firmware. Some USB Power Delivery sources were randomly resetting the iron. As some of you may know, USB PD is pretty strict when it comes to timing — messages need to be acknowledged in under 195µs, which the FUSB302 takes care of, but replies handled by the firmware must come within 15ms. To keep things simple and easy to maintain, I wanted to avoid pulling in any form of RTOS due to the learning curve and hidden complexities. But as features and debug code accumulated, the timing started to slip. So I refactored parts of the firmware to be more cooperative. That fixed one issue — but also exposed another: the firmware didn’t handle unexpected PD messages gracefully. I ended up improving the messaging stack to be more robust overall. It’s still not perfect, and I may revisit it again post-release, but it’s in a much better state now.
Production of the silicone USB Type-C cables is complete, and they should arrive within a week. While I have the theoretical folded dimensions, I’ve been waiting to get a sample in hand before deciding whether to slightly adjust the packaging size.
Thanks so much for your continued patience and support. I know delays are never fun, but I really want to make sure you receive something reliable and thoughtfully engineered. As always, feel free to reach out if you have any questions — or just want to chat.