Spent $80 on a flux pen and it fixed a stubborn cold joint in like 10 seconds

Been fighting a loose connection on an old motherboard for two hours with a regular syringe, grabbed one of those fine tip flux pens off a recommendation, and the joint finally flowed smooth first try, anyone else find a specific tool that just clicks with a certain repair?

2 comments

2 Comments

wesley_fox927d ago

Hold up, eighty bucks for a flux pen? I had no idea they got that pricey, I usually grab the cheapo ones for like 15 bucks. But seriously, I had a similar thing happen with an old PS3's HDMI port, tried regular paste and a toothpick for an hour then grabbed a cheap engineer's flux pen and that joint flowed perfect in seconds. It's wild how the precision tip just makes everything click, I swear half the battle with board repair is just getting the flux exactly where you want it.

gonzalez.grant7d ago

Saw @wesley_fox92 mention the Engineer pen, that's actually the same one I'm talking about, I think it was like 35 bucks not 80, maybe OP got ripped off or it's a different brand. But yeah man, that precision tip is a game changer, I had a similar fight with a laptop keyboard connector, tried regular flux with a needle for twenty minutes, swapped to the pen and the whole thing was done in thirty seconds. It's one of those things where you don't realize how much you needed it until you try it, for me it was a hot air station with a tiny nozzle, just clicked with those tight BGA joints where you can't get a normal nozzle in.