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Customer Review
Reviewed in Canada on May 30, 2014
Works fairly well, but arrived way, way out of calibration. Set to 200C the iron would boil the flux out of my solder and the hot air gun would burn a PCB if held there for more than a few seconds. Bought a thermocouple to calibrate it, found that both the gun and iron were over 200C out of calibration. Once calibrated it holds temperature well. Cal pot close to the edge of the board is for the iron, the one in the center of the board is for the gun. Seems to be clockwise to lower the tip temp, counterclockwise to raise it.
Note that the unit shipped has a "C/F" toggle switch on the front, which I can't find on any other Yihua 898D. Not terribly useful, but it's there. Has a rear power switch to cut power to the whole unit, which is nice, since neither of the front switches actually turn the unit off; they just turn off the corresponding tool. The iron tips it comes with are trash; they aren't even close to a good fit. Replace them with real Hakko tips for a much better experience. The hot air gun tips appear to actually be stainless steel, and fit well. May want to replace the soldered ground lugs inside the case with crimped ones for safety, but the soldering inside the case was well done. The transformer is smallish, but doesn't buzz or heat up.
Final note is that the indicated temperature is only the actual tip temperature when the tip temperature is falling; when the tip temperature is rising, the indicated temp value is the setpoint.
Note that the unit shipped has a "C/F" toggle switch on the front, which I can't find on any other Yihua 898D. Not terribly useful, but it's there. Has a rear power switch to cut power to the whole unit, which is nice, since neither of the front switches actually turn the unit off; they just turn off the corresponding tool. The iron tips it comes with are trash; they aren't even close to a good fit. Replace them with real Hakko tips for a much better experience. The hot air gun tips appear to actually be stainless steel, and fit well. May want to replace the soldered ground lugs inside the case with crimped ones for safety, but the soldering inside the case was well done. The transformer is smallish, but doesn't buzz or heat up.
Final note is that the indicated temperature is only the actual tip temperature when the tip temperature is falling; when the tip temperature is rising, the indicated temp value is the setpoint.
Works fairly well, but arrived way, way out of calibration. Set to 200C the iron would boil the flux out of my solder and the hot air gun would burn a PCB if held there for more than a few seconds. Bought a thermocouple to calibrate it, found that both the gun and iron were over 200C out of calibration. Once calibrated it holds temperature well. Cal pot close to the edge of the board is for the iron, the one in the center of the board is for the gun. Seems to be clockwise to lower the tip temp, counterclockwise to raise it.
Note that the unit shipped has a "C/F" toggle switch on the front, which I can't find on any other Yihua 898D. Not terribly useful, but it's there. Has a rear power switch to cut power to the whole unit, which is nice, since neither of the front switches actually turn the unit off; they just turn off the corresponding tool. The iron tips it comes with are trash; they aren't even close to a good fit. Replace them with real Hakko tips for a much better experience. The hot air gun tips appear to actually be stainless steel, and fit well. May want to replace the soldered ground lugs inside the case with crimped ones for safety, but the soldering inside the case was well done. The transformer is smallish, but doesn't buzz or heat up.
Final note is that the indicated temperature is only the actual tip temperature when the tip temperature is falling; when the tip temperature is rising, the indicated temp value is the setpoint.
Note that the unit shipped has a "C/F" toggle switch on the front, which I can't find on any other Yihua 898D. Not terribly useful, but it's there. Has a rear power switch to cut power to the whole unit, which is nice, since neither of the front switches actually turn the unit off; they just turn off the corresponding tool. The iron tips it comes with are trash; they aren't even close to a good fit. Replace them with real Hakko tips for a much better experience. The hot air gun tips appear to actually be stainless steel, and fit well. May want to replace the soldered ground lugs inside the case with crimped ones for safety, but the soldering inside the case was well done. The transformer is smallish, but doesn't buzz or heat up.
Final note is that the indicated temperature is only the actual tip temperature when the tip temperature is falling; when the tip temperature is rising, the indicated temp value is the setpoint.
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