Just last week i picked up a PACE MBT-350-3Channel solder/smd/rework station, only cost $3k, but now i can un/solder anything ;-)
It has a thin pencil iron, with assorted tips, the finest tip is about the size of an atom, damn its fine....(perhaps i can solder atoms together now?)
Secondly, there's the vacuum desolderer with assorted size tips for different pad-sizes.
Thirdly are the solder tweezers, basically 2 mini irons in a tweezer handle with twin tips (assorted sizes) to heat & lift SMD components off a board in 0.5secs ;-)
oh yeh, the tips go from cold to 350degrees in 6secs!!
Now i can move forward with a whole shipload of projects i have in the pipeline....
At the end of the day, no matter what you buy, just make sure you CAN get spare tips, internal heater elements and whatever else might die or break over time.....
Some of the ebay/chinese imports are great for what they do, and cheap, so you should consider buying 2 (or more) to use for spares sometime down the line.....
MM.
