Electronic Circuits and Projects Forum

The A+ in the title is not my rating, its part of the model number However, If I were to give this unit a rating, I'd give it a B.

Amazon.com: Aoyue 2702A+ SMD Profesional Repair & Rework Station: Home Improvement

I just purchased an Aoyue 2702A+ rework station for performing minor rework at my job. Short review: Great $250 unit for home stuff or if you work for a small company and need it for minor rework. If you work for a large company with deep pockets or if you want something for an assembly line, get something else.

First, this is what the box had in it (from memory):
1. Soldering station
2. Desoldering gun
3. Soldering iron with a smoke absorber YouTube - Aoyue 2702 Smoke absorber function (thats not my video)
4. Hot air gun
5. Stand for soldering iron
6. Springy holster to mount on the side of the unit to hold the desoldering gun
7. Holster to hold hot air gun already mounted upside down on the other side of the unit (easy to fix though)
8. Additional heating element for hot air gun
9. IC popper with a few different popper legs to swap out
10. About half a dozen hot air nozzles including a small 3ish mm circle, 5ish mm circle, and various sized square nozzles
11. Additional tips, filters, and cleaning apparatus for desoldering gun.

The first thing I did after setting it up (there is a red screw on the bottom of the unit that must be removed prior to using! might be easy to miss) was try out the hot air gun as thats all that I really wanted out of the unit. I chose the smaller circular nozzle for the gun and tried to attach it. The nozzle slips over the end of the unit and you turn a screw to tighten it down. This is very difficult to do alone as you must hold the gun, turn the screw with a screwdriver, and hold the nut with wrench so it doesn't slip. I imagine that the more expensive units would capture the nut so that all you'd need is a screwdriver. I have no idea how I would do this if the nozzle was hot. I might be able to let the holster hold the gun while I use the screwdriver and hold the nut....

Anyway, once the nozzle was on there, I turned on the unit, set the air flow to about 30%, temp to 370 deg C, and popped off an 0805 cap lickety split! It does what I need it to do, and it heats up pretty quickly. I hit the off button and the pump went to 100% in a cooldown mode and continued displaying the temperature until it reached 100 deg C and shut off.

I then tried the soldering iron. It heats up like a bat out of hell, 5 seconds or so from room temp to 370 deg C. I think this is faster than my MetCal iron heats up. The smoke absorber does make it a bit cumbersome to hold, and out of habit I hold my breath while I solder. If I can remove it without damaging it, I probably will take it off. As it is, the tip is pretty large compared to the tip on my MetCal so I'll probably use the Aoyue iron to desolder those pesky ground pins and the MetCal for just about everything else.

I haven't tried the desoldering gun yet. I never found them to be that useful, but my boss told me to spend the extra $100 to get the unit with the desoldering tool.

Gripes:
1. Soldering iron temperature is measured in C. I'm used to F, but hell all I have to do is remember to set it to 370 instead of 700. While the iron is heating up, it says "h <current temp>" and when it reaches temp it says "H <current temp>". What is the h and H? When the hot air gun is heating up it uses c and C

2. Hot air gun is HUGE. I've seen a few hot air units and most of them have a gun this size. I don't like it. The one I used at my previous job was the size of a soldering iron (it was a Weller, don't remember model number). It didn't have nozzles to swap out so you only had a 3mm hole, but thats all you really need for most stuff I've found. However, I'll get used to it.

3. Desoldering gun and soldering iron use the same connector. Cant have them both connected. Doesn't bother me much though because I don't really need/want the desoldering gun. If I do start to like the desoldering gun, I still have a MetCal iron that I can do everything but desolder ground pins on through hole parts.

Overall impression: I stated above that this is a good unit for $250, but if you are a line worker and have to use one of these things all day long, get something more comfortable. If this is something you'll use for an hour or two a day a couple times a week, then this unit is fine. (I reserve the right to change my mind if things start to break! ) If I ever need a hot air station for home projects, then I will very much consider this one.