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Desoldering an A/C Power Jack

palindrome

palindrome

Senior member
Bought a Hakko 936 in order to replace a broken A/C Power adapter on a laptop motherboard. This unit goes up to 900 degrees, but doesn't seem to be enough to make the solder bead. Any idea what temp you need to melt solder on these motherboards? And if I need a really hot iron, I could use some recommendations. Any suggestions are welcome and appreciated.

Update 1/30: I got the connector off, but 3 of the 6 places have a broken off part of the connector in it and I cannot get it out using a qwick. I heat it and its like nothing happens. Any suggestions?
 
Jesus, you bought a $75 soldering iron to take out a power jack?

You can do it with a $10 Hakko Blue.

Is the tip 'tinned'? Is it a shiny silver color? Make sure its clean.

How many connections does the jack have to the board? 3? It will take time for the solder to melt because you're not just heating the connector, you're heating the metal connectors + the mass of the solder holding it in place. If you can't melt all of the connectors at the same time, I would just add more solder in a blob until the tip of the iron contacts all three and you can pull the jack out. Be careful, as leaving the iron on too long may delaminate the traces.

 
Originally posted by: PottedMeat
Jesus, you bought a $75 soldering iron to take out a power jack?

You can do it with a $10 Hakko Blue.

Is the tip 'tinned'? Is it a shiny silver color? Make sure its clean.

How many connections does the jack have to the board? 3? It will take time for the solder to melt because you're not just heating the connector, you're heating the metal connectors + the mass of the solder holding it in place. If you can't melt all of the connectors at the same time, I would just add more solder in a blob until the tip of the iron contacts all three and you can pull the jack out. Be careful, as leaving the iron on too long may delaminate the traces.
Click to expand...

Do you have a link to the Hakko blue? I can't seem to find it. I'm looking for the cheapest solution possible to melt and desolder these 6 contacts.
 
http://www.datacomtools.com/catalog/soldering-irons.htm

It's a few pages down on there. I bought mine at fry's a few years ago and it was ~$10.

Some ways to get the DC jack off:
1. Blob solder on the pins until you can pull the jack out. Use the whole tip of the iron.
2. Use desoldering wick to get the solder out, however in my experience this is harder because some of the solder may remain deep in the hole and will hold the jack in.

Practice on a old piece of electronics or something. Solder some wire together and see how the solder adheres/melts.

Edit: Oh insert the plug into the jack when you're prying it out to get a better grip.

 
If you can get some really sharp cutters , it also might be a good idea to cut loose the part of the jack that you can, so it isn't acting as a heatsink to the parts your desoldering.
 
Actually what is happening at least on the ground contact(s) is that you are heating up the ground plane in the mobo. The soldering iron is not powerful enough to heat the local joint to temp w/o losing a lot of heat into the ground plane (a large copper layer that covers a lot of the area of the mobo - can suck up a LOT of heat - ever see a copper heatsink? - making connections?) - which can cause the mobo to delaminate. Learn how to do what you're trying to do before doing it. Things can be seriously damaged the way you're going at it. I used solder wick and a 40W pencil the one time I had to do that. Solder beads on a cold or non-fluxed surface, otherwise it flows...

.bh.
 
Originally posted by: Zepper
Actually what is happening at least on the ground contact(s) is that you are heating up the ground plane in the mobo. The soldering iron is not powerful enough to heat the local joint to temp w/o losing a lot of heat into the ground plane (a large copper layer that covers a lot of the area of the mobo - can suck up a LOT of heat - ever see a copper heatsink? - making connections?) - which can cause the mobo to delaminate. Learn how to do what you're trying to do before doing it. Things can be seriously damaged the way you're going at it. I used solder wick and a 40W pencil the one time I had to do that. Solder beads on a cold or non-fluxed surface, otherwise it flows...

.bh.
Click to expand...

This laptop is dead anyhow without the power jack. It just seems like the solder requires a higher temp than what I have seen/experienced in the past.
 
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