[Elecraft] Building idea

[Karl Larsen]

    I have had the pleasure to build with Surface Mount integrated 
circuits. It is critical to get them to stand up on the outline on the 
printed wiring board, but then when you get the four corners right then 
I just use a tiny amount of solder and get the 28 other pins soldered.

    It is almost impossible to solder that many pins and not have a 
short or 2 or 5 or... This used to be a problem but no more. Now I make 
sure every pin is soldered and then with solder wick from Mouser I suck 
all the excess solder from all 32 pins and look with care and NO shorts 
are found!

    So now I do not worry about a solder bridge. I just fix it after the 
fact. I did this a while back on my T1 auto tuner and it worked just fine.


73 Karl K5DI