Noob question about soldering tools

[Darth Kato]

Hey guys, I'm new to sabers and building. Up until about a month ago i didnt know there were lightsabers available other than the $9 plastic ones at walmart. Been reading on the forum a lot and I'm pretty confident in the parts list I have going as well as the wiring diagram and chassis design. I do have a couple questions i havnt found an answer to yet though.

1. What is the best type of solder to use and what size?
2. What would be the best choice for a soldering iron. I read in one thread where the guy was using too low of a power iron and was doing more damage to the wires than if he had a hotter one. So what is a good power for irons? (Example: 25w, 40w, 60w exc.)
3. What would be a good size tip to use when doing wires to sound boards. (example: 2mm soldering tip)
4. With the NBv2, do the wire go through the board and then solder them? It looks like they do by looking at the pictures but I'm not sure on this.
5. I've seen some videos where guys use hot glue to glue wires down onto the sou dboard to keep them from vibrating and breaking off. Could I use hot glue to adhere a power extender for FOC to a chassis disk so that its not just free floating? Or will the glue damage the board?

I have a few more but I'm sure if I keep looking and reading I'll find the answers to those in the archives :)

[Gnar-Gnar Gin]

Everyone has different budgets and different preferences... for me:

1) I like to use lead free solder
2)I use Radio Shack's pro line soldering iron, i used to use a cheap one, and the difference is huge!
3)I use the standard pro line tip for mine, I found it good all around
4)Most people recommend not going though the board with the wires (easier to break off due to the angles the wires will have in the saber, also tougher to solder properly through the board)
5)I use hot glue to secure my PEx with no issues

[Darth Kato]

Awesome, thank you. How many watts is your soldering iron? I was at radio shack yesterday looking and they have a lot of options. Should I assume the soldering wire size should be the same as the electrical wire I'm using?

[Forgetful Jedi Knight]

Usually soldering stations are in the 40-60W range. No, you should be using really thin soldering wire.

[Silver Serpent]

I'm going to chime in here and state that 60/40 leaded solder is easier to use than the lead-free variety. It's less environmentally friendly, but it's much friendlier for a soldering newbie, especially if your iron is a little underpowered.

My personal preference on soldering irons goes to Weller. You can certainly get the job done with a RS model though. I wouldn't spend a bunch of money on an expensive soldering station unless you were going to be using it for a long time.

[Darth Kato]

I have a Weller 25w iron now, but was thinking it wouldn't be hot enough. Thanks for all the tips and advice, I like to make sure I have everything I needto assemble the components before I order them. I've been watching a lot of videos by Madcow and picking up tips there. I did notice that the colors on the trip rebel LED is limited. I'm wanting to do Orange or Yellow but neither are an option unless I go with the single LED rebel star. Is there more color options I'm not seeing?

[Gnar-Gnar Gin]

Tim updates them as they come back into stock...

[Darth Kato]

Tim updates them as they come back into stock...

Oh I see, thank you. I'll just keep checking back in until he gets the one I want back in. I'm glad you told me that because I was going to run a single rebel star and wire it up for FOC so when I found the one I want I'd just swap the led and heat sink and connect the wires.

[Jay-gon Jinn]

I don't think Tim doesn't stock an Amber/Amber/White Tri-rebel, since it's not listed on the description to give you the lumen ratings. If you want yellow or orange, you'd need to get the RGB and color mix the green and red to get the shade you're looking for.

[Darth Kato]

I don't think Tim doesn't stock an Amber/Amber/White Tri-rebel, since it's not listed on the description to give you the lumen ratings. If you. want yellow or orange, you'd need to get the RGB and color mix the green and red to get the shade you're looking for.

The LED I was hoping to find would be RED/AMBER/WHITE. So the options in this shop is all that are available for the tri rebel LED? I dont know much about mixing colors, im still really new to this stuff. Would I still be able to wire up a FOC if im using all three dice to achieve the orange color?

[Gnar-Gnar Gin]

you may need to custom order that bad boy, i've never seen tim stock that...a certain led supply store has custom star options...

[Jay-gon Jinn]

The LED I was hoping to find would be RED/AMBER/WHITE. So the options in this shop is all that are available for the tri rebel LED? I dont know much about mixing colors, im still really new to this stuff. Would I still be able to wire up a FOC if im using all three dice to achieve the orange color?
The options in the store are all the store offers, not what can be purchased elsewhere. Unless you use a soundboard that can color mix, like the petit crouton 3.0 and the color extender, you will be stuck using one led for the flash, and the other two for the blade color if you use a nano biscotte.

[Darth Kato]

OK that's what I thought. Thank you for the help guys. I'm hoping to get this project started very soon. With the R/G/B tri rebel I'd have to decide between cyan with red flash, or purple with green flash. Both would be pretty cool. :)

[sks1138]

OK that's what I thought. Thank you for the help guys. I'm hoping to get this project started very soon. With the R/G/B tri rebel I'd have to decide between cyan with red flash, or purple with green flash. Both would be pretty cool. :)


Some one can correct me if I'm wrong. With my experience with the NBv2 the FOC is on top of the main blade color. I mixed a G/G/rB tri-rebel for cyan with a green FOC. The green flashes over the cyan giving me a light-ish green color not true green. All three colors mixed for the FOC. Something to keep in mind when deciding on colors.

[Silver Serpent]

That is correct.

[Darth Kato]

Some one can correct me if I'm wrong. With my experience with the NBv2 the FOC is on top of the main blade color. I mixed a G/G/rB tri-rebel for cyan with a green FOC. The green flashes over the cyan giving me a light-ish green color not true green. All three colors mixed for the FOC. Something to keep in mind when deciding on colors.

I was wondering about that. I wasn't sure if when FOC activated, the other colors cut out or if it mixed with the others. So now that we have that figured out, dose anyone know what color you get if you mix R/G/B together?

[Forgetful Jedi Knight]

Basically white.

[Darth Kato]

OK cool, thank you all for the help. :)

[jedimaster_chris]

I really need some help. ive disassembled my anakin Hasbro saber and im stuck. for some reason i can desolder the contacts on the circuitboars to wire up the new luxeon and clash sensor. i have a 60w iron set to 850 degrees and it wont melt the soldering on the board from the factory. am i doing something wrong?