Soldering floor mount elements can appear daunting whenever you’re used to through-hole soldering, however when you discuss to individuals who solder SMD components on the common, they’ll usually inform you they discover it quicker and simpler to solder SMD than through-hole! Not having to flip the board for every part, and having the ability to solder a complete aspect of a chip in a single swipe means with follow you may actually assemble boards rapidly. This DIY Micro SD Card reader isn’t solely a helpful merchandise to have, nevertheless it’s additionally a good way to get some follow soldering surface-mount elements. The capacitors and resistors are 0603, so perhaps you wouldn’t need to take this on as your first floor mount soldering mission, however I’ve shocked myself by having the ability to solder 0402 resistors pretty reliably.
The design is good and easy, only a MicroSD slot, a customized IC designed for this objective, a number of resistors and capacitors, an LED and the USB-A plug. This may very well be finished with paste and sizzling air, or by hand utilizing the correct soldering iron tip, numerous flux, and a great pair of tweezers. Magnification could make a giant distinction too — training soldering beneath a digital microscope is an effective technique to find out how these small elements transfer and react to solder and several types of flux. I personally want a thick, paste flux so I can kind of stick the elements to the board. Solder one result in maintain it in place, after which for chips I do the swipe approach, utilizing solder braid if wanted to do away with solder bridges. And whenever you’re finished, you’ll have a helpful merchandise to have across the lab! I appear to misplace SD card readers on a regular basis, so it by no means hurts to have one other one floating round.
There are a number of glorious sources on-line to point out you learn how to solder floor mount elements; many YouTube movies present the view beneath the microscope so that you get a transparent view of what the soldering iron is doing. Problem your self and provides it a shot! You’ll be an SMD professional very quickly in any respect!
