Today on 0084 A battery powered 486DX2/66 setup and a 386 motherboard with a fancy BIOS I learned about PicoRC: PicoPSU on Retro Computers and also ATX4VC: ATX Power on Retro Computers.
Category Archives: Electronics
LTspice tutorial – EP4 How to import libraries and component models
I learned a lot today in this video: LTspice tutorial – EP4 How to import libraries and component models.
Undocumented LTspice
Today I discovered Undocumented LTspice while reading Introduction to LTspice – MIT (PDF).
SparkFun ATTiny85 Quick Reference
Today I happened upon this ATTiny85 Quick Reference.
Dear Diary
JBC Soldering
Today I stumbled upon: https://www.jbctools.com/. They have some nice looking kit! JBC was mentioned by Dave Jones in EEVblog #596 – World’s Cheapest Soldering Station – Yihua 936 so I went looking.
Quality capacitors: Nichicon
Note to self: I was watching EEVblog #378 – Dumpster Diving Teardown Repair and EEVblog #763 – Dumpster Plasma TV Bad Cap Repair and Dave Jones says Nichicon make high quality capacitors. Apparently Panasonic, Nippon Chemi-Con, Rubycon, and Cornell Dubilier are also good.
Soldering tips from Dave Jones
In his video EEVblog #186 – Soldering Tutorial Part 3 – Surface Mount Dave Jones says to use soldering iron temperature of 300°C to 350°C. He set his hot air gun at 350°C.
He also recommends 4x or 6x magnifications for 0402 SMD and recommends not to use them (or smaller) unless you have to because they can increase manufacturing costs due to being small and fiddly and requiring magnification during soldering. The smaller components can affect yield.
For solder he recommends 0.46mm solder (recommended Multicore brand). And flux. Always use flux.
Also he’s on the record as preferring a chisel tip. In this video he also demoed a thing called a “well tip“, which I have never seen or used before. Apparently good for drag soldering?
While I was researching this post I came across the Hakko Product Lineup, they have some nice looking kit!
p.s. in EEVblog #180 – Soldering Tutorial Part 1 – Tools Dave suggests solder in this order:
- 62sn/36pb/2ag
- 63sn/37pb
- 60sn/40pb
The first one with silver in it can be good for some SMT devices. The second one has a more stable melting point. The third is tried and tested but has variable range of melting points.
Note: sn = tin; pb = lead; ag = silver.