What is the best tempeture to solder battery packs at?

[RH Customs]

What is the best tempeture to solder battery packs at?

[RCHavok797]

What is the wattage of your soldering iron or is it adjustable?

[dhutch]

Battery pack dont like high heat, so get some lowtemp temp solder, and set the iron to 10-15 degrees warmer then the melt point of the solder.

daniel

[ITurnLeft]

Deans Racing Solder and a 40-45w iron, perfect everytime. I've found low temp solder to be weaker, and unreliable.

[RH Customs]

I use a Hakko 936 Soldering Stations and it is digitaly controled. I have been putting my pabke tif and ok iron but now I have a true temp controlled station. Would 700F be to hot?

[ITurnLeft]

lol, yeah.. Aim for half that..

[Battlepack]

It's the opposite of most think, the hotter the better. Hotter is faster. We use 800F. Faster soldering lowers the temp. movment into the cell.

thanks
Steve

I use a Hakko 936 Soldering Stations and it is digitaly controled. I have been putting my pabke tif and ok iron but now I have a true temp controlled station. Would 700F be to hot?

[rcguy2477]

I would think that a higher temperature would be ideal because it can solder much faster. I find that if you hold the soldering iron on a tinned battery bar, and put it on a tinned battery, it will do the job in less than a second. I have built many packs with a weller which is rated for about 800 or more, and it works great.

[RCHavok797]

It's the opposite of most think, the hotter the better. Hotter is faster. We use 800F. Faster soldering lowers the temp. movment into the cell.

thanks
Steve

I agree with the above. The key to doing battery packs is to solder the bars on as quick as possible so you expose the battery to as little heat as possible.

[dhutch]

Yes, agree you need to have it hot enough to do the job quickly, but if your using cooler solder, you dont need it so hot to get it done in th time.

- and ive never had any problem with low temp solder, but then again, i get all my race packs pre-made, so the only soldering i do myself is making practice packs out of old pack (replacing dead cells in one pack from ones recycaled out of others)

daniel

[Battlepack]

Solder with a lower melting points equals higher resistance. :(


Yes, agree you need to have it hot enough to do the job quickly, but if your using cooler solder, you dont need it so hot to get it done in th time.

- and ive never had any problem with low temp solder, but then again, i get all my race packs pre-made, so the only soldering i do myself is making practice packs out of old pack (replacing dead cells in one pack from ones recycaled out of others)

daniel

[dhutch]

Does it? - ah well, there only practice packs!

- But I'll let everyone one else carry on doing what they thing it best!!

- And if i ever decide to make my own pack properly i'll get a big soldering iron and use normal solder.

(does anyone know what in low temp solder, and what about leadfree solder, was that all about!!)

daniel

[G10products]

I have been wondering this also, I got a new solidering iron that can go from 350 to 850 degrees but dont know what to set it at. Before I had that I used a 15w for electronics (microprocessors, non RC stuff) because they are so small it takes less than a second to melt the solider, but had to borrow higher watt irons for RC stuff. Should I go 350 for electronics and 850 for RC stuff?

[RCHavok797]

I have a 85W 788°F soldering iron and it works great for doing all rc related items like soldering battery packs and motor wires. I would stay on the higher end of that range for rc related stuff since the wires you are working with are larger and there is a lot of heat conduction away from the area you are working on. This is especially true in soldering batteries and wires on to motors where there is a lot of metal conducting heat.

[John2005]

I use this one from (don't laugh) Radio Shack http://tinyurl.com/3skhl

Solders each cell in less than a couple seconds. I use 60/40 solder, per the Novak instructions included with their jig.

John

[RH Customs]

That is way to much for just about anythin unless you plan on welding sheet metal together. :eek:

[John2005]

They misposted the temp as 9500 degrees..it should be 950. Also, it has two modes, I use the first which is like 700 degrees. Works perfect every time.

[RH Customs]

now 700 F is a good all around temp, not to cold and not to hot. :)

[eVaDeR85]

I use a regular 30W radioshack soldering iron with a flat blade tip. As long as I pre-tin the batteries and let it heat up between soldering batteries then it seems to do fine.