Don't throw away that dead soldering iron. Fix it!

[Bonzo Moon]

95% of my soldering jobs are in connection with my RC plane builds and shock horror, my soldering iron died the other day. ?. Did you know you can get replacement elements? A 20 min job to save yourself £10. That's £30 an hour! Buys a couple of pints ?.
Here's how to replace the element.

 

 

[Rich Griff]

Where can you get a replacement element from ?

 

Nothing has come up about a "how to...".....

 

Correction, it's just appeared !

Edited May 22, 2021 by Rich Griff

[Bonzo Moon]

Hi Rich,  if you open it in YouTube the link is there. Amazon.  https://amzn.to/3faCU7z £13.54 currently £13.54

[Piers Bowlan]

Antex is a good brand of soldering iron but is a 25W iron enough for most of your RC type soldering work Bonzo? I find 25W is OK for circuit board work but the tip does not have enough mass for soldering on XT60 type plugs to batteries for instance, the heat is wicked away too quickly. I have an Antex 100W iron for soldering on plugs which I have also used to solder up packs of NiMH batteries. I also have a Goot TQ77 (Japanese) pistol type iron which is 20-200W which is my 'go-to' iron that I have used for years (beware of cheap copies).  

Edited May 23, 2021 by Piers Bowlan

[Bonzo Moon]

I find the Antex SX25   25w is ok for most of the stuff I do, as you say circuit boards  and  say small amp ESC's etc.  but the tip is quite small  and for heavier gauge wire the tip heat loss is too much.  I've got another ancient old iron, still only 25W, but that will do heavier stuff like changing a connector on a lipo etc.  or bigger ESC's.

Edited May 23, 2021 by Bonzo Moon
add info

[SIMON CRAGG]

Bonzo, just sent you a PM.