Latest Invention: Cold Heat Soldering Iron

Latest Invention: Cold Heat Soldering Iron

A Cold Heat soldering iron is a tool that seems to break the rules of soldering. As with other soldering irons, it melts solder — an alloy that softens at a low temperature and hardens as it cools. Although solder (pronounced "soder") is commonly used to
connect electronic components, you can also use it to make jewellery and stained glass. With the right type of solder, you can even repair metal containers, like pots and pans, or attach lengths of pipe to one another.

But while most soldering irons plug into a wall outlet, the Cold Heat tool uses batteries. Traditional irons get very hot and take a long time to cool off again, but the Cold Heat tool can heat up, melt some solder and cool off almost instantly. In one TV
demonstration, someone uses the tool and then puts the tip on an inflated balloon — the balloon doesn’t pop.

To anyone who has­ burned a finger, damaged a table or melted a carrying case with a traditional soldering iron, the Cold Heat tool can seem pretty amazing. It’s lightweight and portable, and it can cut down on the amount of time it takes to make small electronics
repairs. On top of that, the Cold Heat tool doesn’t come with the potential for serious injury or property damage. But reviewers — professionals and average users — either love the tool or hate it, and some people question whether it’s really "new" at all.

We wanted to know exactly how a Cold Heat tool works, so we took one apart. In this article, you’ll learn Cold Heat’s secrets, as well as what happened when we tried to use ours.

The Cold Heat tool also has some electronic components beyond basic wiring. A small circuit board is at the end opposite the tip. This circuit board has two diodes, several resistors and a 14-pin integrated circuit.

So, when you turn the Cold Heat tool on, current flows from the negative pole of the batteries through a wire that leads to a small light. From there, it flows to the circuit board and then to the positive battery terminal. As long as solder isn’t in contact
with both halves of the tool’s tip, that’s the end of the process. Once you apply solder, the chip routes lots of power through the portion of the circuit that includes the tip.

Soldering is a fundamental skill for anyone who works with electronics. It’s a basic skill, but getting the hang of it — melting the solder without damaging circuitry or other components and getting the right amount of solder in the right location — can
be tricky. NASA’s Radio Jove project has a set of instructional videos on soldering technique.

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Posted by M. Omer Iqbal bhatti on Nov 3 2011. Filed under Sci-Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry