Why, oh why.

[azrockitman]

Stupid stupid stupid.

So last night I'm wiring and soldering the Safety Ground bus connections, part 1 & 2 on my Stereomour.  Really moving along at a nice pace and could possibly even finish the amp in the new day or so.

I'm on the last wire, and I don't know if I cut it short, or if I simply wound a bit too much wire around the binding post end, but my wire was just a little too short to safely make it all the way through the hole on the solder lug.  I couldn't truly attach the wire to the lug at all.

So, did I cut a new slightly longer wire and use a replacement that was clearly long enough?  nooooo.  I decided I could shove that short wire into the solder lug wire configuration deep enough to where the solder would just magically flow around that unsecured wire like a warm flowing blanket of liquid solder and all would be fine.  In reality, did that work?  noooooo. 

So, first... failed attempt to use desoldering braid ...
and second... failed attempt to get the new desoldering iron I purchased today from radio shack to successfully remove that solder,
and third... failed attempt to simply remove the machine screw and nut and just replace the top soldering lug with a new one...( the repeated heat from all that desoldering must have heated up that screw/nut too much to allow it to come off, it just got stripped at some point)
So, I had to resort to Dremel and cut the damn screw off and now I'll need to go find some new solder lugs somewhere so I can get going again.  Sigh. 

Time, money, frustration, and an entire wasted Sunday that I could have possibly even finished the entire amp.......all of that down the drain because I didn't want to take the time to cut a new piece of wire (for a few pennies and a few seconds).

I guess I'll have to be content with the knowledge that I'll never make that mistake again.

[earwaxxer]

lol!  Great description! We have all done that. Not exactly that, but some approximation to it.

[adamct]

Oof! I feel for you, man...

[4krow]

Since you are looking for a new solder lug, check out the ones at Parts connexion. They are ceramic, and if they don't have a stud to anchor them with, use epoxy. It works quite well for my Quickie.

[Grainger49]

A suggestion...

An inexpensive soldering iron can make pretty good connections.  I know I used a $6 soldering iron for years.  For solder removal in a timely fashion you need a good soldering iron or soldering station.  I prefer solder wick to the solder sucker I have.  And I have a good aluminum bodied solder sucker. 

You need heat to heat the wick, the solder, the lead and the terminal.  There are soldering stations from Hakko available for $35 or there about. 

[azrockitman]

Thanks all

Grainger;  I recently bought a great Hakko soldering station.  But last night, for the life of me, I could not get the wick and solder to heat up sufficiently to remove the solder and I had it on 850'  I've done it before but the solder on this terminal seemed to be perma hard.  Probably my impatience and frustration because tonight, I'm taking my time and giving it more time to heat up the connection and so far I've removed 2out of 3. 

So I've learned more lessons... at my own expense.   

Thanks again

[Grainger49]

Excellent! Sorry for accusing you of a cheap POS (an Infinity speaker I sold in the 70s) when it wasn't.

[4krow]

Infinity Speakers, where are they now? Couldn't find cooler stuff in the 70's

[azrockitman]

 

Back on track now and in hindsight, your comment about heating the wick, solder, lead and terminal is what I was not factoring in the other night.  Heating one wire/connector happens much quicker than 4 items and I was jut not giving it as much time as it needed to heat all 4 sufficiently. 

Now I hope to be listening to music by this weekend. 

[4krow]

  I don't do it too often, but when I heat up that amount of metal I like to really 'wet' the tip of the iron, amking sure it has good thermal contact.

[azrockitman]

Good tip. I'll try that.  Thanks.