Shopping List: Experiments 12 Through 15
98 Chapter 3
Essential: Heat gun
After you join two wires with solder, you often need to insulate them.
Electrical tape, sometimes called insulating tape, is messy and tends to
come unstuck. You’ll be using heat-shrink tube, which forms a safe, per-
manent sheath around a bare-metal joint. To make the tube shrink, use a
heat gun, which is like a very powerful hair dryer. They’re available from
any hardware supply source, and I suggest you buy the cheapest one you
can find. See Figure 3-9.
Essential: Solder pump
This little gadget sucks up hot, melted solder when you are trying to re-
move a solder joint that you made in the wrong place. Available from All
Electronics (catalog item SSR-1) or RadioShack 64-2086. See Figure 3-10.
Essential: Desoldering wick
Also known as desoldering braid. See Figure 3-11. You use this to soak up
solder, in conjunction with the Solder Pump. Available from All Electronics
(catalog item SWK) or RadioShack (part 64-2090).
Essential: Miniature screwdriver set
Dinky little electronic parts often have dinky little screws in them, and if
you try to use the wrong size of screwdriver, you’ll tend to mash the heads
of the screws. I like the Stanley precision set, part number 66-052, shown
in Figure 3-12. But any set will do as long as it has both small Phillips and
straight-blade screwdrivers.
Recommended: Soldering stand
Like a holster for a gun, you rest your soldering iron in this stand when
the iron is hot but not on use. Examples are catalog item 50B-205 from All
Electronics, RadioShack model 64-2078, or check eBay. See Figure 3-13.
This item may be built into the helping hand, but you need an extra one
for your second soldering iron.Figure 3-10. To remove a
solder joint, you can heat the
solder until it’s liquid, then
suck it up into this squeezable
rubber bulb.
Figure 3-11. An additional op-
tion for removing liquid solder
is to soak it up in this copper
braid.Figure 3-12. A set of small
screwdrivers is essential.Figure 3-13. A safe and simple
additional stand for a hot
soldering iron.Figure 3-9. Like an overpowered hair dryer,
the heat gun is used with heat-shrink
tubing to create a snug, insulated sheath
around bare wire.