14 Helpful Soldering Safety Tips at Falconer Electronics

Soldering Safety Tips

Hand soldering printed circuit boards takes tremendous skill, patience, and expertise. As we discussed in a previous blog post, our team at Falconer Electronics has over 100 years of soldering printed circuit board experience. Below includes a list of Soldering Safety Tips that helps keep our staff safe.

Helpful Tips

Soldiering Iron Tips

• For starters, if the soldering iron happens to slip out of your hand, PLEASE DO NOT GRAB IT! The soldering iron is extremely HOT! Let it fall! Keep your cool and pick it up by the handle. Wearing gloves or having a dry cloth nearby will come in handy (yes, the pun was intended).
• Secondly, always return the soldering iron to the stand when not in use.
• Also, keep soldering iron turned off as well as, unplugged when not in use.

Soldier

• Solder runs. Also, it can seep through a hole in a printed circuit board. Furthermore, it will burn you! Ouch! After doing that a time or two, you will wisely consider wearing gloves. Using tweezers to hold the wire works great as well.

General Safety

• Safety Glasses! Wear Safety Glasses! Safety Glasses! By the way, did we mention Safety Glasses? Safety Glasses probably serve as the most important tool and resource that you will use when soldering.
• Wear long sleeves as well as, gloves. Our team has observed that solder plays “Dodgeball”. Solder likes to toss or launch little specs of heat at you. Unfortunately there is little time to “dodge” these bundles of joy. Protect your skin as much as possible. By the way, did we mention to make sure you are wearing safety glasses?
• Also, it is important to place ice or cold water on accidental solder burns immediately. For serious injuries seek medical assistance ASAP!
• Keep a fire extinguisher nearby. Also, make sure it is current and up to code.
• Extract Fumes! Preferably with the use of a ventilation system that vents out of the building. For home use as well as, hobbyist, there are many options including fans with filter boxes.
• Most important, never solder live circuits or wires. This could be an Electrifying experience!

Cleaning Procedures

• Keep the cleaning sponge wet.
• Also, wash hands thoroughly when finished soldering. Especially, if you are grabbing a meal afterward. Lingering solder on your fingers typically does not add value to the tastiness of a meal.
• Furthermore, keep the work station clean and free of clutter. Therefore, cords from the soldering iron will not easily become entangled with other objects on your workstation. The soldering iron can quickly fall. As we mentioned, NEVER grab a falling soldering iron. An even worse result would be finding the soldering iron in your lap.
• Finally, avoid dirt or particles when soldering.

Thank you for reading our blog post on Soldering Safety Tips. Look for continued blog posts on Soldering Circuit Boards this month.