There is no engineering reason for soldering as you go a la Heathkit vs. installing groups of components and then soldering them. I have had both problems mentioned by Skip in my years of building kits: overlooked solder joints and components in the wrong holes. In my experience, looking for a missed solder joint is preferable to removing a mis-installed component that might damage the traces and/or the component.
When I built my K2 #6011 about 12 years ago, I followed the instructions in the manual believing the beta testers of the kit were far more experienced than me in the building process that would produce the best outcome. I can recall building other kits where I had soldered-on-way all of one kind of component only to find the last remaining part was not what it should have been. Arghhh! In the final analysis, it’s probably a personal preference of the builder as to which process to use. I have one of the components testers mentioned that is invaluable in determining component values with my aging 81 year old eyes. Color codes on resistors made today are hard enough, and tiny black letters on NP0 capacitors that are blue are impossible for me to discern. Now…enough talking and time for me to tackle one of my YUK (Yet Unbuilt Kits). Let the Melt Solder begin. Clark / WU4B Sent from Gmail Mobile On Thu, Mar 7, 2024 at 6:41 PM Fred Jensen <k6dg...@gmail.com> wrote: > Back in the point-to-point wiring days it was common to place a number > of components at once, folding the leads/wires over the terminals and > then soldering all of them. It was said to cut down on misplaced > components because you were focused on selecting the right components > and placing them correctly and not interrupted by soldering. I found it > often led to unsoldered connections. > > It apparently carried over when things moved to thru-hole PCB's. I > found that also led to unsoldered components. When I built my K2, I: > > 1. Banned the Hoover from the shack until I was done > > 2. Sorted the components into baking tins > > 3. Mostly placed and soldered components individually after triple > checking. I'm colorblind and can't read color codes so every resistor > was checked with the ohmmeter. I asked my wife once to read a couple of > color codes ... "That one is sort of a pinkish salmon, this one is a > light mauve." Gave up on that. > > 73, > > Fred ["Skip"] K6DGW > Sparks NV DM09dn > Washoe County > > Harold Howells wrote on 3/7/2024 11:28 AM: > > Hello and thanks in advance for your help. I’m just getting going on my > K2 build and I don’t understand the reasoning behind putting all the > capacitors in the PCB, bending their leads to hold them in place, and then > soldering them all at the end? This seems to me create a big mess with > components all out of whack. What is the reason for doing it this way? HH > > > > Harold Howells > > hhowe...@intrq.com > > > > > > > > > > ______________________________________________________________ > > Elecraft mailing list > > Home:http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > > Help:http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > > Post:mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > > > This list hosted by:http://www.qsl.net > > Please help support this email list:http://www.qsl.net/donate.html > > Message delivered tok6dg...@gmail.com > > > > -- > This email has been checked for viruses by AVG antivirus software. > www.avg.com > ______________________________________________________________ > Elecraft mailing list > Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft > Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm > Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net > > This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net > Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html > Message delivered to clark.macau...@gmail.com ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
