[00:00.720 --> 00:04.760]  Hello friends, Joe here from HackerBoxes. Today we're going to learn how to solder.
[00:05.360 --> 00:14.480]  And we're going to learn to solder using this cool little kit, which we call a badge buddy.
[00:16.020 --> 00:21.140]  It has some blinking LEDs and a battery and a switch. So not many components, it's pretty
[00:21.140 --> 00:24.900]  easy to make. It's a nice first start if you haven't soldered before.
[00:25.600 --> 00:29.980]  So first let's talk about what is soldering. So soldering is just melting solder, which
[00:29.980 --> 00:35.540]  is an alloy, a metal alloy, that has a very low melting point. So we melt the solder using
[00:35.760 --> 00:40.160]  a soldering iron, a tool like this, and we melt it between things that we want to connect
[00:40.160 --> 00:44.440]  together, usually connecting them electrically, although we will discuss that there's more
[00:44.440 --> 00:49.680]  to it than that. We see things that are soldered all the time and we have the entire world
[00:49.680 --> 00:54.460]  around us is full of electronic gizmos that have components soldered onto circuit boards.
[00:54.680 --> 00:58.680]  So it's a big part of our lives whether we stop and think about it or not. Being able
[00:58.680 --> 01:03.400]  to solder is a really nice skill to have because you can repair things, modify things,
[01:03.400 --> 01:07.980]  connect wires to things to read data in and out of them. It's a really excellent hacker
[01:07.980 --> 01:13.180]  skill, a nice DIY skill. Once you get into it, you'll find that it comes in handy a lot
[01:13.180 --> 01:17.440]  and it's one of these skills that you can kind of apply to a lot of different things.
[01:18.080 --> 01:22.880]  Alright, I thought I would start by just saying, you know, kind of big picture, there's kind
[01:22.880 --> 01:28.220]  of two things that we want to kind of keep in mind that are really important. The first
[01:28.220 --> 01:32.040]  one is pretty obvious and it's almost sort of a joke. You've probably seen these pictures
[01:32.040 --> 01:36.300]  online. This is a soldering iron. It's off, obviously. If it smells like chicken, you're
[01:36.300 --> 01:42.680]  holding it wrong, okay? Always hold the rubber handle. So that's the first big picture item.
[01:42.680 --> 01:48.220]  The next big picture item is to realize that you always need more solder. And I don't mean
[01:48.220 --> 01:51.680]  by that that you need to go out and always buy some more solder because you need to have
[01:51.680 --> 01:57.120]  lots of solder. But when you're working, soldering, working on some work that needs to be soldered,
[01:57.120 --> 02:02.000]  you'll find initially that generally you need more solder than you think you need. And when
[02:02.000 --> 02:05.160]  something isn't working right, you need to add more solder to it. And sometimes that's
[02:05.160 --> 02:09.480]  counterintuitive, especially when we're trying to unsolder something. Adding more solder
[02:09.480 --> 02:13.760]  is a vital part of unsoldering. So just keep those two things in mind. You know, the first
[02:13.760 --> 02:17.520]  one's obvious. The second one can be a little counterintuitive. Smells like chicken, you're
[02:17.520 --> 02:22.560]  doing it wrong. Number two, you probably always need more solder. Just don't be afraid to
[02:22.560 --> 02:30.580]  add more solder. So solder serves three purposes. And I think this is one of these important
[02:30.580 --> 02:36.660]  things because there's some subtle importance to these three different things. And they're
[02:36.660 --> 02:43.440]  different and contained in the fact that these three things that solder does are separate
[02:44.980 --> 02:49.720]  jobs of the solder. Contained in that are some of the common problems that people have
[02:49.720 --> 02:55.260]  as they're getting into soldering. So the first one is almost obvious. It's that soldering
[02:55.260 --> 02:58.220]  mechanically connects two things. So it's almost like glue. You're almost using it like
[02:58.340 --> 03:02.540]  a hot glue. You melt it between two things and it connects them. You know, but is that
[03:02.540 --> 03:07.120]  enough? Certainly not. Because really often the main point of the solder, aside just holding
[03:07.120 --> 03:10.580]  two things together, is you have to have a good electrical connection. Something that
[03:10.580 --> 03:13.960]  current will flow through. Not something that will easily break apart and not something
[03:13.960 --> 03:19.220]  that actually has small gaps in it. So if you go at it thinking I just need to get these
[03:19.220 --> 03:23.960]  two things stuck together like glue and you don't think about needing to have that really
[03:23.960 --> 03:30.280]  nice electrical bond, you might be missing something. And the third thing, which is this
[03:30.280 --> 03:34.580]  is the part that's a little subtle that often people miss in the very beginning. And usually
[03:34.580 --> 03:38.460]  this is one of these things where when you get this, usually your soldering game goes
[03:38.460 --> 03:42.660]  up to the next level. And that's that one of the jobs of the solder is actually a thermal
[03:42.660 --> 03:46.900]  conduction. And what I mean by that is because there's two different ways that that's true.
[03:46.900 --> 03:51.540]  But the one that's really important is that it is the solder that allows heat to flow
[03:51.540 --> 03:56.860]  from the soldering iron onto the work. Okay, so if you don't have solder in the play before
[03:56.860 --> 04:00.700]  you even start soldering, in other words, if your tip isn't tinned, if you don't have
[04:00.700 --> 04:04.800]  the work, the pieces of work, meaning the wire and the pad or whatever it is you're
[04:04.800 --> 04:10.800]  trying to solder together, you don't have solder in play, there won't be a thermal conduit
[04:10.800 --> 04:14.280]  for heat to go from the tip of the soldering iron into the work, which is really what you
[04:14.280 --> 04:18.180]  want to do as we'll discuss. So just remember that part of the job of the solder is to actually
[04:18.180 --> 04:23.340]  be a thermal conductor. Okay, so it's a mechanical bond, it's an electrical conductor, but it's
[04:23.340 --> 04:26.920]  also a thermal conductor. And the second way in which it's a thermal conductor is in some
[04:26.920 --> 04:30.720]  instances where you have components that get warm while they're operating. So maybe let's
[04:30.720 --> 04:37.920]  say a linear regulator or something. It being bonded with solder onto a PCB or some other
[04:37.920 --> 04:42.480]  substrate can allow the thermal energy to flow out of it to keep it cool so it doesn't
[04:42.480 --> 04:47.500]  overheat. So that's kind of a secondary way. But what I'm really talking about when I say
[04:47.500 --> 04:52.400]  this subtle thing about thermal conduction is while you're soldering, you need the solder
[04:52.400 --> 04:58.600]  to help do the soldering. It isn't just a glue, it's actually a conduit of the making
[04:58.600 --> 05:02.960]  of the connection. So try to keep that in mind. So let's talk about some of the tools
[05:02.960 --> 05:07.540]  and supplies that we use when we're soldering. The first obvious one is a soldering iron.
[05:07.540 --> 05:15.260]  The really cool thing about soldering irons is in the last 15 years or so, the price profile
[05:15.260 --> 05:20.360]  of soldering irons has changed quite a lot. Now for what would have been unheard of 20-30
[05:20.360 --> 05:24.620]  years ago, you can get for a price that would have been unheard of, meaning even as little
[05:24.620 --> 05:29.540]  as like $20, $30, $40, you can get a very nice soldering iron. I know the soldering
[05:29.540 --> 05:33.960]  irons that I came up wishing that I could have had but I only had access to in a lab
[05:33.960 --> 05:40.520]  because they were $250. Now we get soldering irons all the time that are in the $20 range
[05:40.520 --> 05:48.180]  that are of similar quality. Controllable temperature and very nice tips that stay very
[05:48.180 --> 05:54.740]  clean for a very long time. So that's a nice thing is soldering irons are readily available
[05:54.740 --> 05:57.660]  now and they're not super expensive. I mean you can still spend a lot of money on a really
[05:57.660 --> 06:02.260]  nice soldering iron but generally what you really want is just one that has a nice quality
[06:02.260 --> 06:06.720]  tip that's replaceable. Although you'll find you might not actually need to replace it
[06:06.720 --> 06:11.840]  very much if it's a nice tip. And you need to be able to adjust the temperature because
[06:11.840 --> 06:15.480]  there are times when you want a little more heat on the tip or a little less heat. You
[06:15.480 --> 06:19.740]  also just don't want it to just always be some preset random amount. So, you know, really
[06:19.740 --> 06:26.480]  inexpensive soldering irons don't have a temperature adjustment. All right, another tool or part
[06:26.480 --> 06:30.360]  of a tool you'll need is you'll need to always be able to clean the tip of your soldering
[06:30.360 --> 06:35.040]  iron. You basically have to keep it clean all the time. If you're thinking always clean
[06:35.040 --> 06:38.060]  the tip or constantly clean the tip, you'll end up cleaning it a lot which is what you
[06:38.060 --> 06:41.980]  really need. You need to clean that tip very, very frequently while you're using it. It's
[06:41.980 --> 06:45.600]  not just something you do at the very end while you're putting it away. So most soldering
[06:45.600 --> 06:52.860]  iron stands come with a little sponge, SpongeBob, SpongeBob Square Sponge like this that's just
[06:52.860 --> 06:57.840]  at the bottom of the stand. Just get that wet. Some people keep a little bottle, like
[06:57.940 --> 07:02.660]  a little drinking water bottle next to their soldering station so they can always just
[07:02.660 --> 07:08.000]  keep that thing wet without having to run off to get it into the sink. That's fine for
[07:08.000 --> 07:11.340]  when you're starting out. You know, just rub it on that sponge. Rub the tip of your iron
[07:11.340 --> 07:14.780]  on that sponge frequently, like almost every time you put the soldering iron down or pick
[07:14.780 --> 07:19.720]  it up. Just constantly be cleaning it. And then as you get a little more into soldering,
[07:19.720 --> 07:29.240]  kind of like a style point tool, you might get one of these little kind of shaved metal
[07:30.100 --> 07:39.460]  tip cleaners. These are pretty nice. You just kind of stab the soldering iron into it. Scrape,
[07:39.460 --> 07:43.760]  scrape, scrape. And it scrapes the tip of the soldering iron. You can just do that frequently
[07:43.760 --> 07:46.780]  while you're using it. Every time you go to set the soldering iron down or pick it up,
[07:46.780 --> 07:50.580]  just kind of stab it in there a couple times. So the nice thing about the metal, the kind
[07:50.580 --> 07:55.460]  of... it's almost like a little Brillo pad. It's like a... I think they're usually made
[07:55.460 --> 08:00.000]  of brass. And it's like metal wool. I think people call it metal wool or steel wool. It's
[08:00.000 --> 08:04.520]  not technically steel wool. But these type of cleaners, the really nice thing about them
[08:04.520 --> 08:10.020]  is because they're not wet, they don't conduct as much heat away. So that's really good.
[08:11.820 --> 08:15.580]  Yeah, so those are probably the main tools you need. It's also nice to have some flush
[08:15.580 --> 08:21.740]  cutters like, you know, these little guys, which are really very tiny. And one side
[08:21.740 --> 08:29.360]  of them is flat so you can cut wires off flush to a circuit board. At some point, you will
[08:31.380 --> 08:36.420]  want to be able to remove the residue that's left on a circuit board after you solder it.
[08:36.960 --> 08:40.720]  You know, this is called cleaning the flux. So you'll want a flux cleaner or a lot of
[08:40.720 --> 08:46.920]  people just use rubbing alcohol, isopropanol, and a little very stiff brush, an acid brush,
[08:47.460 --> 08:50.480]  to just clean the back of the board. In the beginning, you don't really need to worry
[08:50.480 --> 08:55.120]  about that too much. You can just clean it with a tissue or just, you know, don't worry
[08:55.120 --> 08:58.280]  about it too much for a board like the one we're going to do today. But when you start
[08:58.280 --> 09:00.860]  making circuit boards you want to be able to keep for a while, you want to be able to
[09:00.860 --> 09:06.420]  take that residue off. And we'll discuss why you want to do that. So you'll want whatever
[09:06.420 --> 09:10.600]  solvent you're going to use for that. Like I said, isopropanol is usually fine. And maybe
[09:10.740 --> 09:17.680]  a little brush or something. And at some point you're going to want to have a flux
[09:17.680 --> 09:25.400]  that you can deliver to the board. So flux is the thing that cleans the work. It cleans
[09:25.400 --> 09:29.100]  the surface that you're going to be soldering on. It also breaks the surface tension of
[09:29.100 --> 09:32.880]  the solder when it's liquid so that it can flow a little easier. So it's a cleaner and
[09:33.020 --> 09:37.940]  a flowing agent. And flux is just kind of important. I've heard some people refer to
[09:37.940 --> 09:41.320]  flux as grease. So if you've heard people say that, that's what they mean. But it's
[09:41.320 --> 09:47.380]  not grease. It comes in a liquid or gel or it comes in little pen dispensers that look
[09:47.380 --> 09:52.140]  like a fat magic marker. A lot of people these days really like the gel. It's become readily
[09:52.140 --> 09:55.600]  available. I usually use the liquid just because that's what I've always used. And I get a
[09:55.600 --> 10:00.360]  little dispenser bottle. Let's see if I have one of these. A little dispenser bottle. These
[10:01.220 --> 10:04.480]  are extremely inexpensive so you can have a few of them loaded up. And you can see the
[10:04.480 --> 10:10.420]  flux that I have in there is a liquid. So you're going to want some flux. Like I said,
[10:10.420 --> 10:17.180]  there's a bunch of different kinds of flux. The most basic kind of flux is rosin. I don't
[10:17.180 --> 10:21.660]  know if it says it on here. It says flux on there. I don't know if you can see it. It's
[10:21.660 --> 10:26.400]  very tiny. But for the most part, all the solders you're going to use, we'll discuss
[10:26.400 --> 10:31.640]  solder again in a second, they're rosin core, meaning they have rosin flux inside the solder.
[10:31.640 --> 10:35.100]  So when you're using the solder, it's kind of auto-fluxing. It's self-fluxing. So you
[10:35.100 --> 10:42.000]  don't need to apply flux from a pen or a bottle. But as you get a little more advanced in soldering,
[10:42.000 --> 10:45.000]  you're going to want to have flux. But for the very beginning, using the flux that's
[10:45.000 --> 10:50.080]  inside the solder is totally acceptable. You'll be able to get away with doing a lot of work
[10:50.080 --> 10:55.460]  just using the flux that's inside the solder. But I'll speak more to that in a minute. There
[10:55.460 --> 10:58.760]  are some things you have to keep in mind when you're using the flux in the solder. So that
[10:58.760 --> 11:05.460]  flux is what leaves a residue on the board sometimes when you're done soldering. And you
[11:05.900 --> 11:11.900]  might want to clean that off because the way the flux cleans the surfaces, it's usually an acid.
[11:12.120 --> 11:16.220]  It's not a super strong acid, but it's acidic. And if you leave it on there, it's great when
[11:16.220 --> 11:22.500]  you're trying to solder because it'll clean the oxidation and dirt and oils off of the work so
[11:22.500 --> 11:26.100]  that your solder will flow. But if you leave it sitting on there for a long time, it might
[11:26.100 --> 11:29.260]  eat into the board a little bit or pit the surface. And you know, plus it just usually
[11:29.260 --> 11:33.520]  looks a little yucky. So it's kind of nice to clean it off. But for your first few projects,
[11:33.520 --> 11:39.260]  and certainly for soldering this first batch, buddy, don't worry about that. But just know
[11:39.260 --> 11:44.360]  what flux is. At the point where you want to start cleaning flux or using a separately applied flux
[11:44.360 --> 11:48.480]  other than just the flux core in the solder, it'll come to your mind that, oh, I want this other
[11:48.480 --> 11:53.260]  thing. And just worry about it then. You don't need to worry about that for right now. But yeah,
[11:53.260 --> 11:58.280]  as far as the solder goes, there's a lot of different options when it comes to solder.
[11:58.280 --> 12:07.620]  The basic options are tin-lead alloy. A lot of people call it 60-40, although there's slight
[12:07.620 --> 12:13.300]  variations. They're not always exactly 60-40, 60%. I think it's 60% lead, 40% tin, or it might be the
[12:13.300 --> 12:20.920]  other way around. I'm not sure. But let's see, it might tell us on here. 60% tin, 40% lead. That's
[12:20.920 --> 12:27.500]  the basic solder. Like I said, it has a flux core in it. And this one right here, you can see it's
[12:27.500 --> 12:34.100]  fairly thin. This is a 0.6 millimeter solder. I usually get 0.6 or 0.8 millimeter. I've used
[12:34.100 --> 12:38.880]  one millimeter before too. That's fine as well. But you generally want something that's fairly
[12:38.880 --> 12:42.520]  thin. If it's too thin, when you're soldering something larger like a connector or something
[12:42.520 --> 12:45.840]  or something that has like a big heat pad or something, you'll find that you need to use a
[12:45.840 --> 12:50.260]  long length of it. That's not a big deal. Just use a little more. Some people like to have a
[12:50.260 --> 12:55.680]  thicker one for doing stuff like that and then the thinner one for doing smaller work. That's
[12:55.680 --> 13:01.100]  not nothing you really need to worry about right now. One thing I do want to comment on is a lot
[13:01.100 --> 13:07.680]  of people get caught up in the lead-free solder. And of course, we'll talk about safety in a little
[13:07.680 --> 13:15.400]  bit. Lead is a potentially toxic substance. So if you're concerned about it, you can use lead-free
[13:15.400 --> 13:21.920]  solder. I don't. Most people that are really into soldering really hate lead-free solder. It has a
[13:21.920 --> 13:28.500]  much higher melting point. It's very annoying to work with. It's really hard to rework. It's just
[13:28.500 --> 13:31.700]  not the best thing in the world. And if you're pretty careful, you know, you shouldn't be
[13:32.180 --> 13:36.360]  sticking soldered wires or circuit boards in your mouth anyway or letting children play with them.
[13:36.360 --> 13:41.180]  So, you know, you don't get lead inside of you by simply by touching it. You have to touch it and
[13:41.180 --> 13:45.700]  lick your hands. Or you have to, you know, chew on the thing that has the lead on it. Lead doesn't
[13:45.700 --> 13:51.200]  just float up in the air. So, you know, of course, you know, if you're working somewhere and they have
[13:51.740 --> 13:54.960]  safety policies on this, you know, read your safety data sheets and all that. That's not
[13:54.960 --> 14:00.400]  my expertise. But, you know, I can just tell you that most people that are soldering experts,
[14:00.400 --> 14:06.610]  you know, they prefer to use the standard 60-40 leaded solder. It's just much, much easier to
[14:06.610 --> 14:11.330]  work with. And lead has a very low melting point. So anyway, those are the kind of solder things you
[14:11.330 --> 14:19.630]  need. Speaking of melting point, if your soldering iron has an adjustable temperature on it,
[14:20.430 --> 14:25.750]  a common question is, well, what do I set that at? So I usually set mine right at about 350 degrees.
[14:26.550 --> 14:31.990]  That's Celsius. Maybe a little higher than that sometimes. And that works out to about 660
[14:31.990 --> 14:39.110]  Fahrenheit if you have an older rig that has a Fahrenheit rating on it. So yeah, just kind of
[14:39.110 --> 14:43.270]  keep in mind like 350, 360, something like that. And you can go a little lower if you're working
[14:43.270 --> 14:46.850]  on something really fine and you're worried about heating it up too much. Or a little higher if
[14:46.850 --> 14:52.150]  you're soldering like some big screw lugs or something that needs a lot more heat delivered.
[14:52.450 --> 14:57.070]  You know, if you kind of sense that your tip is getting cool too quickly, you might want to
[14:57.070 --> 15:04.470]  turn the temperature up a few degrees. So yeah, remember that 350C or 660F will kind of keep you
[15:04.470 --> 15:11.630]  in the right range for melting the lead tin alloy solder. If you decide to use lead-free solder,
[15:11.630 --> 15:15.170]  you're going to need to go up a little bit. And you can find the specifications for whatever
[15:15.170 --> 15:20.250]  solder you're using. It'll have a melting point, but the tip temperature needs to be much higher
[15:20.250 --> 15:23.590]  than that melting point. So it'll usually have a melting point than a specified tip temperature.
[15:24.070 --> 15:30.230]  All right, so temperature... soldering irons are really hot. So we joked before about the
[15:30.230 --> 15:33.170]  chicken thing. I'm going to mention it a few times because you just want to be careful not
[15:33.170 --> 15:39.090]  to burn yourself. There's a few safety points to keep in mind here. That's probably the one
[15:39.090 --> 15:42.210]  that we almost don't need to mention. I mean, we're melting metal. Of course, it's hot. Don't
[15:42.210 --> 15:46.330]  stick your fingers in it. Don't clean it on your tongue. All those things, right? So just remember
[15:46.330 --> 15:50.810]  it's hot, okay? The next safety point... we're going to have four safety points. The first one is heat.
[15:50.810 --> 15:55.010]  Don't burn yourself, all right? Don't burn yourself. Don't burn your desk. Don't start a fire.
[15:55.010 --> 16:00.430]  Just remember it's hot. Heat. The first one is heat, okay? Number one, heat. Number two are fumes,
[16:00.430 --> 16:04.210]  okay? And a lot of people think this has something to do with the lead. It doesn't. It's when you're
[16:04.210 --> 16:09.610]  soldering, there's that rosin core in there. And the flux, that rosin core, it will gas off. It'll
[16:09.610 --> 16:14.970]  make kind of a smoky smoke. And you don't want to breathe that, all right? So you want to have a
[16:14.970 --> 16:18.510]  little... what I have on my workstation is I actually just have a small fan and it just kind
[16:18.510 --> 16:25.330]  of blows into the corner. Because that smoke, that residue, it'll settle very quickly. So if you
[16:25.330 --> 16:31.550]  just blow it away from your work, that's probably fine. I don't recommend this, but I've actually
[16:31.550 --> 16:35.490]  noticed even with my fan on, just because I've been soldering for so long, when I solder, every
[16:35.490 --> 16:40.150]  once in a while I'll just go... and I'll just blow the smoke away. If the smoke is rising up into my
[16:40.150 --> 16:45.210]  face, I don't want to inhale it. So I just... and then I inhale. Probably not smart. Probably not
[16:45.210 --> 16:49.850]  safe. Just keep the fan on. You can buy a really nice little fume extractor hood that has a little
[16:50.470 --> 16:55.850]  like a filter. I think it's a charcoal filter in it that keeps the... gets the soot trapped. And
[16:55.850 --> 16:58.650]  it's very nice. So if you're going to solder a lot, you might want to get one of those. You don't want
[16:58.650 --> 17:02.610]  to be breathing those fumes, okay? So number one was heat. Number two was fumes. Number three is
[17:02.610 --> 17:10.050]  lead. We already talked about the lead. So when you're soldering with lead solder, lead can get
[17:10.050 --> 17:13.850]  on your hands. Just like, you know, if you were touching a lead pipe or something like that.
[17:13.850 --> 17:18.810]  Also, little bits of lead break off. I think it's called dross. And, you know, maybe even...
[17:19.830 --> 17:24.750]  they're almost microscopic. Sometimes they are macroscopic. But... and you'll even notice little
[17:24.750 --> 17:30.030]  bits of... little tiny balls of solder around your work area after you've soldered a lot. That stuff
[17:30.030 --> 17:34.150]  is called dross. And if that's sticking on your hands and then you lick your finger or you eat
[17:34.150 --> 17:38.030]  your lunch and haven't washed your hands, that lead can get in you. That is particularly a problem
[17:38.030 --> 17:42.050]  for children. So if you're soldering in an area where there's children, you want to clean that
[17:42.050 --> 17:47.870]  lead up. So after you work with leaded solder, you need to wash your hands. Okay? And this isn't
[17:47.990 --> 17:51.850]  a hand sanitizer situation because this is not... you're not trying to kill bacteria or something.
[17:51.850 --> 17:55.950]  You're literally trying to wash a metal away and get it off of your hands so that it doesn't get
[17:55.950 --> 18:00.570]  inside your stomach, in your mouth. Okay? And also, if you have these little dross bits and
[18:00.570 --> 18:06.530]  there's a child that comes through your work area and they're very little and they might, you know,
[18:06.530 --> 18:10.810]  drop a toy somewhere where you have these little dross droppings or whatever and put it in their
[18:10.810 --> 18:14.630]  mouth. Or if you saw... if you've recently soldered something and they might say, oh look, that's a
[18:14.630 --> 18:18.110]  cool badge buddy and stick it in their mouth. That's not cool. You don't want to get lead inside
[18:18.110 --> 18:21.870]  you. You do not want a child getting lead inside them. Okay? It's not that big of a deal. There's
[18:21.870 --> 18:26.410]  other things in your house that's lead, but you do not want little chunks of lead, you know, that
[18:26.410 --> 18:30.570]  break off of things sitting around. Just wipe it up with a wet wipe. Wash your hands. Clean it up.
[18:30.570 --> 18:35.090]  Just keep it clean. Don't get this lead around the place. Wash your hands after you work with
[18:35.090 --> 18:40.290]  leaded solder. All right. So heat, fumes, lead. Right? Those are three things. And then this last
[18:40.290 --> 18:45.910]  one is huge because people just don't think about it that much. But please wear safety goggles.
[18:46.170 --> 18:50.010]  You don't want to get... you don't want to fling a little drop of hot solder in your eye. You know,
[18:50.130 --> 18:54.490]  a really big thing is, you know, you're cutting your leads off, especially ones that might be a
[18:54.490 --> 18:59.910]  little thick. And they go... and the lead flies off and it hits the wall. And you're always like, oh
[19:00.510 --> 19:06.050]  that sounded nice. Well, that doesn't sound nice if it hits you in the eye. All right? You only get...
[19:06.050 --> 19:09.630]  no, you actually get two eyes. Anyway, you probably want to keep both of them. So protect
[19:09.630 --> 19:14.950]  them. Wear some eye protection. All right? You only get those two eyes. All right. So great. So
[19:14.950 --> 19:19.150]  let's actually get the soldering now that we've covered sort of the theoretical background stuff.
[19:19.150 --> 19:22.350]  And I guess this might be a good time for me to say there's a lot of great soldering videos out
[19:22.350 --> 19:26.610]  there. If you just get on YouTube and look for things about soldering, you'll hear mostly all
[19:26.610 --> 19:30.090]  these things I already said. But, you know, maybe you'll pick up some other pointers. And sometimes
[19:30.090 --> 19:33.530]  it's good to hear things explained from different people. So, you know, if you like soldering and
[19:33.530 --> 19:37.770]  want to get better at it, definitely watch some other videos. You know, we're only going to barely
[19:37.770 --> 19:41.510]  touch on, for example, surface mount soldering. So there's some great surface mount soldering
[19:41.510 --> 19:46.910]  videos out there that you can find. So that's a nice segue to our next thing. You know, I like
[19:46.910 --> 19:51.670]  to think of there being three structures for soldering. Two of them we're going to do here
[19:51.670 --> 19:55.530]  today. And that's through-hole soldering, when you have a hole in a circuit board, like, you know,
[19:55.530 --> 19:59.390]  it's called a through-hole, a plated through-hole. And you put a wire or a post through it and then
[19:59.390 --> 20:02.830]  you solder it into that hole. Right? There's through-hole soldering. And then there's surface
[20:02.830 --> 20:07.750]  mount soldering, where you have a pad on a circuit board and you solder something onto that pad. So
[20:07.750 --> 20:11.190]  it doesn't go through the board, it just solders onto the surface. And, you know, when you see
[20:11.190 --> 20:16.750]  these, like, really large chips that have, you know, many tens or even hundreds of little leads
[20:16.750 --> 20:20.590]  sticking out of the sides, those are all surface mounted, or these little tiny resistors that look
[20:20.590 --> 20:25.270]  like little rectangles that don't have any wires, like, those are surface mounted. Today we're just,
[20:25.270 --> 20:29.110]  we're going to do one really big surface mount thing, and that's our battery clip. But it gives
[20:29.110 --> 20:32.970]  you the idea of what surface mounting is, so it's a nice exposure for that. So we have through-hole
[20:32.970 --> 20:37.030]  surface mount. Through-hole is something called TH, sometimes called TH. Surface mount is often
[20:37.030 --> 20:42.630]  called SMT, surface mount technology. And then the third thing is just, I guess I might call it
[20:42.630 --> 20:48.670]  point-to-point soldering, and it's when you just solder two wires together. You usually strip the
[20:48.670 --> 20:52.610]  two wires, twist them together, and then solder them, and making sure you get solder flowed
[20:52.610 --> 20:56.290]  completely into the joint. Another example of that kind of point-to-point soldering is when
[20:56.290 --> 21:00.050]  you're soldering a wire into a connector or something like that. So that isn't exactly
[21:00.050 --> 21:05.110]  through-hole, and it's not exactly surface mount, it's just a different kind of soldering. But,
[21:05.110 --> 21:08.430]  you know, if you always think of those three things, they all kind of work the same, but they
[21:08.430 --> 21:12.890]  all have little, you know, differences that, and it's nice to make sure you get some practice in
[21:12.890 --> 21:20.090]  doing all three of those. All right, so let's get right into this example. Actually, first let me
[21:20.090 --> 21:25.070]  just say, you know, so the basics of soldering are, and we've already touched on this a little bit,
[21:25.070 --> 21:30.030]  so I'm going to say these things a few times just to make sure they really sink in. So you have two,
[21:30.030 --> 21:33.530]  let's say, let's say you just have two surfaces. You either have the hole with the wire in it,
[21:33.530 --> 21:37.050]  which is, you know, the hole is a surface and the wire is a surface for through-hole,
[21:37.050 --> 21:43.970]  or you have a pad with a terminal of a component sitting on the pad if it's surface mount.
[21:44.090 --> 21:50.270]  So, but there's usually two things, right? The pad and the lead, or the hole, the through-hole
[21:50.270 --> 21:55.330]  and the lead, the plate of through-hole and the lead. And what you want to do is heat up
[21:55.950 --> 22:00.450]  the junction, so both of those things. You want to heat both of the things you're trying to connect
[22:01.290 --> 22:07.070]  hot enough so that solder will flow onto them, all right? So there's a few things that you're
[22:07.070 --> 22:11.890]  trying to do all at once here. So when you go to heat them, you need to have some solder between
[22:11.890 --> 22:16.750]  the soldering iron and the connection. And this is not the solder that you need to flow into the
[22:16.750 --> 22:22.630]  connection later. This is just the thermal connecting solder. So you have the two components
[22:22.630 --> 22:26.070]  sitting together. So often what you'll do is you'll have the two components, you know, near each other
[22:26.070 --> 22:30.350]  in some way. They're next to each other, either inside of each other or sitting on top of each
[22:30.350 --> 22:35.770]  other. So you put the iron near them, get a little solder on it, on the iron, just so that that
[22:35.770 --> 22:41.290]  solder can touch to the work and conduct heat into the work, right? So that's not the solder that
[22:41.290 --> 22:48.210]  makes the connection. It's the solder that is used to enable the connection to be made
[22:49.390 --> 22:53.830]  by allowing the soldering iron to then heat the items up, right? So that first little bit of
[22:53.830 --> 22:58.010]  solder you put on there, you're really putting it on the iron and it heats up the two items,
[22:58.010 --> 23:02.670]  that heats up the work, let's call it the work. And then once the work is hot enough, it's up to
[23:02.670 --> 23:07.930]  that melting point of solder, then you touch the solder to the work, not to the iron, and the work
[23:07.930 --> 23:12.770]  will melt the solder onto itself. And that's how you get a beautiful, nicely flowed solder connection
[23:12.770 --> 23:17.770]  where the solder flows onto the work and is not just kind of being brushed on there by a soldering
[23:17.770 --> 23:23.210]  iron, right? So again, you do not use the soldering iron to apply the solder. You use the
[23:23.210 --> 23:27.950]  soldering iron with a little preliminary bit of solder on it to heat up the work enough so then
[23:27.950 --> 23:34.950]  the solder melts onto the work, right? So anyway, that's a thing that, you know, when you get it,
[23:34.950 --> 23:41.070]  when you get that really nice flow of solder on something, when you have the metal really hot,
[23:41.070 --> 23:44.670]  and then the metal melts the solder, not the soldering iron. The soldering iron immediately
[23:44.670 --> 23:49.570]  heats the metal up. The trick is you need a little solder initially to be able to get the heat from
[23:49.570 --> 23:54.610]  the soldering iron into the metal or the work. So that's one of the main things you're doing there.
[23:54.610 --> 23:58.330]  The other thing is, remember, your solder has your, especially, you know, if you're using,
[23:58.330 --> 24:04.570]  you don't have a bottle of flux, you're just using rosin core solder, your solder has your
[24:04.570 --> 24:10.590]  flux in it. So you need to be adding solder. I don't want to say constantly, but the process of
[24:10.590 --> 24:16.230]  making the solder connection, you need to be adding solder because the flux comes out when you melt the
[24:16.900 --> 24:20.830]  So before you make the connection between the two pieces of metal,
[24:20.830 --> 24:26.850]  those surfaces need to have flux on them. So you have to melt the solder in their vicinity
[24:26.850 --> 24:31.030]  so that the flux gets on them, and then that allows the solder to flow onto them. So the two
[24:31.030 --> 24:35.570]  things kind of happen at once, the heating and flowing of solder and the application of flux,
[24:35.570 --> 24:40.390]  because they're coming in the same delivery package, right? The strand of flux you're using
[24:40.390 --> 24:46.810]  has the rosin, the strand of solder you're using has the rosin flux inside of it, okay?
[24:47.410 --> 24:51.850]  And another important thing about that is, sometimes when you get solder on a connection
[24:51.850 --> 24:56.670]  and you're moving it around or you're still working the connection in some way,
[24:56.670 --> 25:04.250]  the smoke that came up, that's your flux burning. It's your flux boiling off. That smoke that came
[25:04.250 --> 25:09.470]  up that got sucked away or that, you know, if you followed my incorrect instructions, you blew away.
[25:09.470 --> 25:14.610]  So now that flux is gone, okay? So that's one of these things where you need to add more solder,
[25:14.610 --> 25:19.130]  because the solder has the more flux in it, right? So if you're continuing to work the item,
[25:19.130 --> 25:24.430]  you only have so long before your flux is gone, okay? And then, you know, if you get to the point
[25:24.430 --> 25:28.150]  where you've melted a bunch of solder on it and there's this big mess, you need to take the solder
[25:28.150 --> 25:32.150]  away, which sometimes you can just lift it off with iron. It'll stick on the iron and you can,
[25:32.150 --> 25:39.370]  you know, clean it on your sponge or your metal tip cleaner. And then you can apply
[25:39.370 --> 25:44.390]  some more fresh solder, which will have new flux in it, releasing a little more smoke.
[25:45.730 --> 25:49.330]  So this is part of that thing I said, where you need to be always ready to put a little more
[25:49.330 --> 25:52.690]  solder on, because you need the solder because it conducts the heat. You also need the solder
[25:52.690 --> 25:57.090]  because it has the flux inside of it. And the flux doesn't stick around. You only get a few seconds
[25:57.090 --> 26:00.990]  to use, to flux the surface with the solder. That's why, you know, you need to keep adding
[26:00.990 --> 26:04.950]  more solder. Even if then you get to the point where there's too much metal on there, too much
[26:04.950 --> 26:08.950]  solder, you just pull it off, just clean it off. You're going to need the flux. And when you get
[26:09.310 --> 26:12.590]  a little more advanced with this stuff and you're doing a lot of connections, you know,
[26:12.590 --> 26:15.970]  really small packages that have a lot of pins, that's where you just want to get a bottle of
[26:15.970 --> 26:21.250]  flux and just drench the thing with flux or put gel flux on it so it's all soaked with flux. Because
[26:21.250 --> 26:25.270]  then you can work it, you can move the solder around, you can add and remove solder, and the
[26:25.270 --> 26:31.010]  flux is still there doing its job of cleaning and breaking the surface tension of the molten solder.
[26:35.040 --> 26:42.840]  So this is the badge buddy. Comes in a Ziploc bag like this and there's some stickers in there.
[26:42.840 --> 26:47.880]  We got this during Defcon 28. We did some sticker swapping. So there's a bunch of different
[26:47.880 --> 26:53.740]  stickers in here from lots of our friends and members in the community and other vendors.
[26:54.840 --> 27:02.840]  You see such as Hack5 and Hacker Warehouse and just random stickers. So that's lots of fun.
[27:07.500 --> 27:13.340]  And yeah, let's see. Yeah, there's some good ones in here. Yeah, there's a Hack5 sticker,
[27:14.040 --> 27:29.970]  a couple Hacker Boxes stickers, hologram sticker. Yeah, Hacker Warehouse gave us these. They have
[27:29.970 --> 27:36.170]  some little camera covers on them to keep your camera safe. So all right, yeah, the parts that
[27:36.170 --> 27:43.210]  are in here are fairly basic and represent opportunity to do a little bit of surface
[27:43.210 --> 27:50.430]  mount and also some through-hole soldering. There's a bead chain that you can use to
[27:50.430 --> 27:54.490]  connect the badge buddy to your lanyard or your backpack or whatever when you're done.
[27:56.130 --> 28:01.310]  There's a coin cell battery. It's a lithium battery,
[28:01.310 --> 28:10.020]  CR2032. It's a pretty common lithium battery coin cell. That's the
[28:11.840 --> 28:16.400]  clip that holds the coin cell onto the back of the PCB.
[28:30.490 --> 28:33.790]  All right, let's get these things out of our way here.
[28:34.550 --> 28:40.110]  We'll solder these four items to the PCB, to the circuit board with
[28:42.150 --> 28:47.030]  the logo on there. It's the Hacker Boxes logo. His name's Bithead or Circuithead, depending on
[28:47.850 --> 28:52.610]  which version he is. So we're going to get some solder out. We're going to start by
[28:52.610 --> 28:57.250]  tinning the tip of the soldering iron. This one's already tinned because we use it a lot.
[28:57.250 --> 29:03.590]  Then we're going to tin these three pads, these surface mount pads on the board. But you want to
[29:03.590 --> 29:08.970]  always keep the tip of your soldering iron tinned. Keep some solder on it. The flux will help clean
[29:08.970 --> 29:14.870]  it. And every time you see the soldering iron going off the screen here, that's just me cleaning
[29:14.870 --> 29:20.050]  the tip in a tip cleaner. So we're going to tin these three pads by just getting some solder
[29:20.050 --> 29:25.410]  flowed onto them. And again, we're not just melting it on there. It's actually bonding into the
[29:26.370 --> 29:29.630]  pad, the solder that's already on the pad from the manufacturing process.
[29:30.430 --> 29:34.530]  And when you're surface mount soldering, well, with any soldering, you really want to
[29:34.530 --> 29:39.190]  pay attention to the orientation. So this little clip is oriented according to the
[29:39.190 --> 29:43.830]  white paint on the board that's called the silkscreen. So the board has been silkscreened
[29:43.830 --> 29:48.610]  with these positioning indicators. And most boards have this. When you lay out a circuit
[29:48.610 --> 29:53.450]  board, you can design the silkscreen. So the silkscreen shows you which direction that the
[29:53.450 --> 29:57.470]  battery holder goes. And in this case, you could put it the other way. It's just a little harder to
[29:57.470 --> 30:05.210]  put it in. So we intentionally oriented it so the clip opens downward. So now what we're doing
[30:05.210 --> 30:13.510]  is we're getting solder to flow onto the little wings on the side of this battery clip, battery
[30:13.510 --> 30:20.390]  holder. And we're actually heating the clip up enough so that solder flows onto it. So remember,
[30:20.390 --> 30:24.710]  we need a little solder on there just to conduct into the metal of the clip. And then you can see
[30:24.710 --> 30:29.470]  the solder flows really nicely and makes a nice shiny surface. So you want to make sure when
[30:29.470 --> 30:35.050]  you're soldering, you always end up with a shiny surface that flows neatly onto all of the metal
[30:35.050 --> 30:39.110]  around it. And that lets you know you do not have what's called a cold solder joint. If you just
[30:39.110 --> 30:44.270]  dump hot solder on a cold metal, it won't flow onto the metal and it won't bond. And that will
[30:44.270 --> 30:49.650]  be a cold joint, which is mechanically unstable and can be broken off pretty easily. And you do
[30:49.650 --> 30:53.910]  you never want that. That's like the most important thing to avoid while you're soldering is getting
[30:53.910 --> 30:59.430]  cold solder joints. But you can see these are nice, well flowed, well... it's called wetted.
[30:59.430 --> 31:06.030]  The solder is fully wetting the board. So yeah, so the indicator on the silk screen for the LEDs
[31:07.050 --> 31:14.090]  shows the flat side. So the LED has a flat side on it and the flat side goes to the short pin.
[31:14.090 --> 31:23.890]  So the short pin is going through the board so that it lines up with the flat side on the
[31:23.890 --> 31:28.550]  leads through the holes. And we're going to get them on the other side. And you can usually just
[31:28.550 --> 31:32.770]  bend the leads a little bit to hold it in place. But then also we're going to set the board down
[31:32.770 --> 31:38.430]  on the component side down, which will hold the pieces into place. And that's why when you're
[31:38.430 --> 31:44.190]  soldering, you often start with the lowest altitude or the lowest thickness parts first.
[31:44.190 --> 31:49.610]  Because then as you flip it over, you can get basically the table to help you hold
[31:49.610 --> 31:53.870]  them into place. And then just things don't get in your way when you do that. So again here we're
[31:53.870 --> 31:58.170]  just flowing solder. We're using a little tiny bit of solder to heat up the joint and then getting
[31:58.170 --> 32:03.230]  the solder in there so that the heat of the joint melts the solder into the joint.
[32:03.590 --> 32:07.490]  And there's just four little through-hole posts here. It's actually quite easy. And you can see
[32:07.490 --> 32:13.130]  I'm moving pretty quickly because, you know, like I said earlier, you want to be able to
[32:13.130 --> 32:20.370]  use the flux. And the flux will disappear over time. See, it's not smoking anymore because
[32:20.370 --> 32:25.750]  the flux is gone. So while the flux is still in there, you want to get the work done. So you do
[32:25.750 --> 32:31.510]  want to move a little bit as quickly as possible without creating errors or
[32:31.510 --> 32:36.430]  making a mess. All right, now we're going to cut the leads off. This is where you need to be wearing your
[32:36.430 --> 32:46.610]  safety goggles. And then some people like to go back. I usually like to do this and hit the
[32:47.190 --> 32:56.110]  cut-off part with the soldering tip again just to get the solder, basically the wound that was
[32:56.110 --> 33:00.610]  left behind by the cutter, just to make it nice and smooth. But, you know, that's your option. And the
[33:00.610 --> 33:04.750]  switch is also through-hole. You can put it on the front or the back. I think since, you know,
[33:04.750 --> 33:08.310]  it doesn't really matter. Putting it on the back means you don't have to see it. It leaves the
[33:08.310 --> 33:13.810]  board looking kind of nifty. So you can just push it through those three holes here. If I can
[33:14.630 --> 33:20.170]  get that to stick in there right. The leads are really short on that on that switch. And so here's
[33:20.250 --> 33:26.490]  a good example where you want to get one of the pins soldered. And then maybe, you know, just get
[33:26.490 --> 33:30.610]  one soldered here. And then maybe check and see, make sure the other three or the component is
[33:30.610 --> 33:35.890]  lined up. Because, you know, while only one pin is soldered, you can reflow it very easily and move
[33:35.890 --> 33:39.910]  the component around a little bit. This is important when you're doing like a chip that
[33:39.910 --> 33:45.190]  has a lot of pins. You just get a corner tacked down and then you can move the chip around just a
[33:45.190 --> 33:49.510]  little bit by just reflowing that corner. And then once everything's lined up, you can go ahead and
[33:49.510 --> 33:56.890]  solder down the rest of them. But it's even useful for just a little switch like this. There's a lot
[33:57.610 --> 34:01.550]  of play in those holes. You can move that the switch around a bit. So it just helps you line
[34:01.550 --> 34:12.730]  it up nice and straight. All right, all three pins of those. And that switch is just an on-off
[34:12.730 --> 34:18.370]  switch. It just opens the circuit between the battery and the two LEDs. And now these are not
[34:18.370 --> 34:23.190]  just regular old LEDs. They actually have a little circuit inside of each of the things.
[34:23.190 --> 34:27.230]  They're in an LED, a five millimeter LED package. But there's a little circuit in there that actually
[34:27.230 --> 34:32.610]  cycles three different LEDs inside the package. So each of those packages, while it looks like an
[34:32.610 --> 34:39.470]  LED, it's actually three LEDs and then a little circuit that will make some cool flashing patterns.
[34:40.390 --> 34:46.270]  We're going to get this coin cell open. It's a lithium coin cell. I'll show you how to install
[34:46.270 --> 34:52.390]  that. These are packaged really well because the manufacturer of the batteries doesn't want them
[34:52.390 --> 34:58.830]  shorting out and causing any trouble. So they completely encapsulate the battery to keep it safe.
[35:00.270 --> 35:04.690]  Anyway, we take that and we flip the positive side up. I'm going to show you there's a little
[35:04.690 --> 35:09.690]  on the top. Flip the positive side up and that obviously means the bottom is ground.
[35:09.910 --> 35:14.170]  And then slip it in there. And the part of the reason why we tinned that pad underneath the
[35:15.950 --> 35:19.630]  clip is because the center pad actually becomes the terminal.
[35:20.070 --> 35:25.390]  And there you go. That's Bad Buddy. Nice, beautiful blinking lights.
[35:26.490 --> 35:31.050]  It's very colorful and the lights blink quickly and then slowly in different speeds. And if you
[35:31.050 --> 35:34.670]  leave it on for a few seconds, the colors will get out of sync, which makes it look a little more
[35:35.770 --> 35:44.810]  discotheque. It's pretty cool. Okay, so that was pretty cool. So I said we would talk a little bit
[35:44.810 --> 35:52.810]  about... just give you some of the keywords about removing solder. If you need what's called
[35:52.810 --> 35:57.470]  rework, meaning something's already soldered and now you need to rework it or reflow it, you need
[35:57.470 --> 36:02.070]  to heat the solder up so that you can take the parts apart. Sometimes you want to remove the
[36:02.070 --> 36:07.130]  solder. So you can use this thing called solder braid, which is basically just this really finely
[36:07.130 --> 36:12.170]  braided wire, and it has a lot of flux in it. And it'll suck... if you just put it between your
[36:12.170 --> 36:17.230]  iron and a piece of work, once it gets warm, it'll kind of draw the solder out of the work.
[36:17.230 --> 36:24.010]  You can also use a solder sucker. One of these guys right here. So you create a vacuum in there
[36:24.010 --> 36:29.970]  and then when you trigger it, it sucks the solder out. So yeah, I wanted to point out when I did
[36:29.970 --> 36:34.290]  that, a couple little chunks of solder flux flew out of there and you do not want to eat that or
[36:34.290 --> 36:38.050]  leave it where a child might need it, okay? If you get that on your hands like I just did, you
[36:38.050 --> 36:45.370]  want to wash it off before you eat or, you know, floss or whatever you might do that might get in
[36:45.370 --> 36:51.790]  your mouth, all right? Yeah, so braid, suction... just remember you're going to need more solder
[36:51.790 --> 36:56.270]  either of those things you're doing. You need more solder, you might need flux. Again, you know,
[36:56.270 --> 37:00.070]  you'll figure these things out, you get to them. Just don't be afraid to use more solder. Don't be
[37:00.070 --> 37:03.630]  afraid to get some flux going on things when you need it or add more solder to get the flux
[37:03.630 --> 37:08.630]  melted in there. All right, so hopefully this is useful. There are a lot of resources online you
[37:08.630 --> 37:11.970]  can find about soldering. If you have any questions, you know, hit us up here at Hackerboxes.
[37:13.550 --> 37:17.650]  Yeah, and like I said, I hope that was interesting. I hope you're open to soldering some more
[37:17.970 --> 37:21.930]  projects. You know, we sell a lot of kits at hackerboxes.com and there are a lot of fun things
[37:21.930 --> 37:27.290]  out there to solder. Even if you don't get them from your actual like kits, just things that you
[37:27.290 --> 37:34.490]  might want to rework or modify or try to repair. You know, like I said, it's a very handy skill.
[37:34.650 --> 37:37.610]  I hope you enjoy it. Thanks for spending this time with us. Take care.