Chose a hot air station over a soldering iron for my first phone repair, and it cost me | Electronics Repairers - Freelance Forum - The Community for Independent Professionals

Eva Johnson · 2026-10-11T10:45:04.058908+00:00

I picked up a cracked iPhone 11 from a guy at the flea market for $40 about two months back and had to decide between a $25 soldering iron or a $70 hot air rework station to deal with the charge port. I went cheap and grabbed the iron because I figured heat is heat. Bad call. I lifted two pads off the board trying to get the port loose and the phone is now a paperweight sitting in a drawer. Ended up ordering the hot air station anyway and did a clean port swap on a Pixel 4a in about 20 minutes. So my question is, do you all keep both tools on the bench or just run hot air for everything now?

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Chose a hot air station over a soldering iron for my first phone repair, and it cost me | Electronics Repairers - Freelance Forum - The Community for Independent Professionals