Soldering iron recommendations

Danny1969

Lol, you said your's is genuine so I'm sure it's fine. Just don't think Amazon is a safe haven of quality merchandise because it really isn't. 

TADodger

@TrentGuitars - don’t you set fire to my new guitar now!!

TrentGuitars

TADodger said:

@TrentGuitars - don’t you set fire to my new guitar now!!

It’s ok yours is still safely in a timber yard!

TADodger

Grangousier

I'm curious whether Amazon have had to act to officially sidestep their legal responsibility in court, yet? It would be an interesting test case, seemingly waiting to happen. But an expensive one, I suppose, which is why it wouldn't. 

(The only recommendation I have re soldering irons is "Don't pick it up by the pointy end". This recommendation also works for kitchen knives, rattlesnakes and ocean liners.)

Dave_Mc

TrentGuitars said:

Just got mine and did the full strip down, it’s completely genuine 

Glad to hear it!  

normula1 said:

Dave_Mc said:

I think it should be ok if it's actually sold by Amazon.

A colleague mentioned a few days ago that where an item is sold by Amazon, they basically get supply from "wherever" and stick in a container in the Warehouse and the item is removed and sold at random. So in theory it's actually more likely to be non-genuine as they won't know who / when an individual item was supplied to them..

I'd like to think that in this day and age of everything being tracked to the n'th degree this wouldn't be true, but who knows?

Wow that's not great. Is that the stuff actually sold by amazon, though, or just fulfilled? I've never (far as I'm aware!) had a problem with anything fake which I actually bought from Amazon which was also sold by them, but maybe I'm being naive  

Danny1969 said:

Amazon is awash with fakes of everything and they don't give a shit even when it's pointed out by qualified people that some of the products they allow to be sold can cause fires and kill people. 

Amazon sell things directly but they also stock and ship from third parties and lastly and worse ... allow people to sell anything on Amazon directly shipped from home. There's several back doors to list stuff without the correct ASIN ... that's how we got started selling on there. 

We used to sell around 30 to 40Ks worth a month on Amazon. Mainly batteries, chargers and other electronic. All  products were genuine Dell, IBM, HP etc with the correct short circuit / over current protection and built to the correct safety standard for 240V products. After a while we noticed other sellers were advertising the supposed same products for half the price and I suspected they were fake. So I purchased some for examination and sure enough, complete fakes made with none of the protection circuits or shielding required by law. They were half the weight and poorly glued together. There was no required  separation on the board between the directly rectified 240 side and the secondary. 
I contacted Amazon and told them, they weren't interested. I emailed  them a picture of a charger that had blown apart when exposed to 250V, they weren't interested. I pointed out all the chargers I purchased had the same identical serial number sticker and they weren't interested. 
None of the listings were removed and we gave up selling genuine spares on a site awash with cheap fakes. 

I buy on Amazon myself but there's certain things I won't buy for safety reasons. I'm not gonna risk a fire to save £20

Wow that's ridiculous. I know Which? is always complaining about that type of stuff, that tends to be with the fulfilled (or even just marketplace) stuff, though, doesn't it? As I said above, maybe I'm just being naive but I always try to buy anything  critical as "sold by Amazon" for that reason...

Wazmeister

My brand nEw little use Hakko 888 will be up for sale v soon

Ossyrocks

Quick update to this thread.

As I stated earlier in this thread, I bought the HAKKO FX-888D direct from the distributor. I hadn’t had chance to use it until this weekend and when I did, I was/am very disappointed. It’s basically useless even for soldering a quarter inch jack. I’ve been on the phone with them today, been talked through all the factory resets, even upped the temperature to 495C and it still barely touches anything I try to use it on. 

I have now been told to send it back for testing at the distributor, at my own cost (insured), which I have not been told will be refunded. 

I ended up using my old Antex XS25, which did the job well.

I’m hoping that this is just a one off broken unit and that I get a replacement which actually works.

Bah humbug.

Rob

robinbowes

Ossyrocks said:

Quick update to this thread.

As I stated earlier in this thread, I bought the HAKKO FX-888D direct from the distributor. I hadn’t had chance to use it until this weekend and when I did, I was/am very disappointed. It’s basically useless even for soldering a quarter inch jack. I’ve been on the phone with them today, been talked through all the factory resets, even upped the temperature to 495C and it still barely touches anything I try to use it on. 

I have now been told to send it back for testing at the distributor, at my own cost (insured), which I have not been told will be refunded. 

I ended up using my old Antex XS25, which did the job well.

I’m hoping that this is just a one off broken unit and that I get a replacement which actually works.

Bah humbug.

Rob

Sorry to hear this, Rob.

Personally, I\d ask them to arrange collection of the one that's not working, send you a new one, and stop messing about. You've only had it 5-6 weeks so they don't have a leg to stand on.

R.

Ossyrocks

robinbowes said:

Ossyrocks said:

Quick update to this thread.

As I stated earlier in this thread, I bought the HAKKO FX-888D direct from the distributor. I hadn’t had chance to use it until this weekend and when I did, I was/am very disappointed. It’s basically useless even for soldering a quarter inch jack. I’ve been on the phone with them today, been talked through all the factory resets, even upped the temperature to 495C and it still barely touches anything I try to use it on. 

I have now been told to send it back for testing at the distributor, at my own cost (insured), which I have not been told will be refunded. 

I ended up using my old Antex XS25, which did the job well.

I’m hoping that this is just a one off broken unit and that I get a replacement which actually works.

Bah humbug.

Rob

Sorry to hear this, Rob.

Personally, I\d ask them to arrange collection of the one that's not working, send you a new one, and stop messing about. You've only had it 5-6 weeks so they don't have a leg to stand on.

R.

I pushed hard for that, but no, the guy wanted it back to test it first and I had to post it. He’s also not able to test it until next Wednesday. It’s in the post already now. If it comes down to it, I’ll try to get Barclaycard to claw it back for me.

It is disappointing though, I’ve basically bought the industry standard iron and my 20 year old Maplin one is better.

Rob

robinbowes

Ossyrocks said:

I pushed hard for that, but no, the guy wanted it back to test it first and I had to post it. He’s also not able to test it until next Wednesday. It’s in the post already now. If it comes down to it, I’ll try to get Barclaycard to claw it back for me.

Well, the guy is wrong, IMO.

Why not follow-up and say you'd like a replacement sending ASAP, and they can keep the faulty one for testing for as long as they like?

R.

Dave_Mc

Ossyrocks said:

Quick update to this thread.

As I stated earlier in this thread, I bought the HAKKO FX-888D direct from the distributor. I hadn’t had chance to use it until this weekend and when I did, I was/am very disappointed. It’s basically useless even for soldering a quarter inch jack. I’ve been on the phone with them today, been talked through all the factory resets, even upped the temperature to 495C and it still barely touches anything I try to use it on. 

I have now been told to send it back for testing at the distributor, at my own cost (insured), which I have not been told will be refunded. 

I ended up using my old Antex XS25, which did the job well.

I’m hoping that this is just a one off broken unit and that I get a replacement which actually works.

Bah humbug.

Rob

Wow that's awful. IIRC I didn't get round to using mine for several weeks after I got it, and I was a bit worried if something was wrong with it I could be in trouble...

Maybe it's just a typo, but IIRC the max temperature is 480C? If you set it higher than that, it just doesn't go to the temperature. (But that wouldn't explain its not working at lower temperatures.)

jca74

Ossyrocks said:

 

Can anyone recommend a couple of other useful tips?

Just to reply to a 6 week old question...

Make sure you wear appropriate eye protection before holding the hot end whilst soldering the wrong side of a PCB...

hywelg

I've always used these, mostly the heavy duty 100w and 200w irons for work and found them pretty solid and reliable. When they do fail you can get parts no problem. Caveat--- you do need a soldering iron to repair your broken one!

https://www.weller-tools.com/professional/EUR/en/Professional/Product+lines/WE+Line/Mains-powered+soldering+irons

Ossyrocks

Another update on the Hakko saga.

I returned it for repair or replacement (at my cost). A chap called Derek said it needed "recalibrating", which he said he did and they sent it back. I got no refund for my insured return to them.

I have tried using this iron now twice since, and ended up with it on full temp (480 C), and it still is basically rubbish. In the end I finished the job with the old Antex XS25 again. I must say that at this point I am really disappointed with it.

I've called them this morning to explain that I want to return it for a full refund. I didn't get the answer I wanted, instead I am going to get a call from Derek again, who I expect will try to fob me off, again. If I don't get a satisfactory result today, I am going to have to see if my credit card company can claw the cash back for me.

robinbowes

Ossyrocks said:

Another update on the Hakko saga.

I returned it for repair or replacement (at my cost). A chap called Derek said it needed "recalibrating", which he said he did and they sent it back. I got no refund for my insured return to them.

I have tried using this iron now twice since, and ended up with it on full temp (480 C), and it still is basically rubbish. In the end I finished the job with the old Antex XS25 again. I must say that at this point I am really disappointed with it.

I've called them this morning to explain that I want to return it for a full refund. I didn't get the answer I wanted, instead I am going to get a call from Derek again, who I expect will try to fob me off, again. If I don't get a satisfactory result today, I am going to have to see if my credit card company can claw the cash back for me.

Man, that sucks. At the very least, it's shocking customer service.

I'd say you shouldn't have any problem getting your money back from Barclaycard.

Good luck.

R.

Dave_Mc

^ Agreed, that's awful.  

The whole point of buying something more expensive is that it's supposed to be "better". Mine is way better than my old Antex (same one as yours, I think), for example. (So it should be, it cost a lot more- probably 8-10 times as much!)

But if your old Antex is more fun to use, there's something seriously wrong.

Ossyrocks

So, they haven't called me back as promised, so I have called them again, repeatedly in order to get through as their answerphone system just says "recording failed". Their contact form on the website is also broken and says "Google reCAPTCHA verification failed, please try again later." They will not process a return and refund until "Derek says so". If he decides I'm just being difficult, then they will not refund. He's the one who said it was fine and sent it back to me. Not looking good.

Philtre

Don't waste any more time on this. Get onto the CC company and get your money back. Their customer service seems abysmal so let's make sure everyone knows about it...

Ossyrocks

Philtre said:

Don't waste any more time on this. Get onto the CC company and get your money back. Their customer service seems abysmal so let's make sure everyone knows about it...

Well, I have had a return call from Derek! He really dug his heels in and wanted it back to test again. I refused and stuck to the full refund request.

Eventually he agreed, but not before arguing that he couldn't refund for the tips as they couldn't be re-sold as they were used! I said this was unacceptable too and after some discussion he agreed to refund those too. After some more pushing, he also agreed to refund all my shipping costs (for both returns). It's now packed up and ready to go back, and I have emailed customer services with the details, and cc'd Derek.

It's been quite a trial, so let's see how long it takes to get my money back, which is now £211.64 in total.

A word of caution. He indicated that this would be re-sold, so pity the poor bastard who gets my old one!

Rob