I prefer a pair of curved tweezers to align the surface mount part. Just tin the pads slightly, place the part on top, and heat it up.

Posted at 1:03 am on Aug 25th, 2008 by tony

@1

yeah, that is what I do, but I only tin one pad to hold it down. With multi pin chips, tin the opposite corners first and then heat to hold in place.

Posted at 1:18 am on Aug 25th, 2008 by diy audio projects

on the note about the reset… i’ve had atmegas reset on me with too low voltage. 3.3 v? project i’m working on needs attinys running at 3.3 volts, but my supplier has no stock of the low voltage chips (attiny85v). will the standard attiny85 reset at 3.3v? anybody know?

Posted at 2:41 am on Aug 25th, 2008 by charlie

• Speed Grade for attiny85
– ATtiny25/45/85V: 0 – 4 MHz @ 1.8 – 5.5V, 0 – 10 MHz @ 2.7 – 5.5V
– ATtiny25/45/85: 0 – 10 MHz @ 2.7 – 5.5V, 0 – 20 MHz @ 4.5 – 5.5V

So lowest bound is 2.7v, only time I’ve got resets is when I didn’t have a .1uf or 1uf power cap close to the atmel.

Posted at 4:50 am on Aug 25th, 2008 by spaceballs

@2

with a part so small, i find its easy to get both sides hot enough to melt the solder at once. Opposite corners is definitely the way to go with larger packages. An adjustable temperature iron is nice too.

Posted at 1:29 pm on Aug 25th, 2008 by tony

Cant you just use a heatgun?

Posted at 3:15 pm on Aug 25th, 2008 by Sharky

Much better video, I find it nice when the camera is in focus.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NN7UGWYmBY

Posted at 5:59 pm on Aug 28th, 2008 by miles

just posted video SMD construction using ‘reflow skillet’ technique.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WT46jkLKyoc

took about an hour to construct, time-compressed the video down to 9 minutes…

Posted at 7:34 pm on Sep 26th, 2008 by sixerdoodle