My old mentor told me flux is flux, so I bought the cheapest stuff for 5 years

I was cleaning a board last week and the joints looked terrible. After 3 tries I finally asked a guy at the local electronics shop what I was doing wrong. He pointed at my $4 bottle of flux and said that's the problem. Switched to a name brand gel flux and my solder flows smooth now. Anyone else get bad advice from someone who seemed to know what they were talking about?

2 comments

2 Comments

jesser791mo ago

My dad taught me to change oil every 3000 miles without fail... spent years doing that until a mechanic buddy told me modern cars can go way longer. Felt pretty ridiculous standing in the auto parts aisle after that.

olivia_allen1mo ago

$4 flux? Man, that's not flux, that's just brown water with a fancy label. I once tried to solder with a bottle I found at a dollar store and it smelled like burnt honey and left this crusty brown residue everywhere. My joints looked like I'd used play-doh instead of solder.