Hello all,

Just to be direct with the community for a moment.

This group has been growing at an astronomical rate. Every day there are large numbers of new users joining who are trying to learn electronics repair, diagnostics, soldering, tools, workflow, business operations, and everything in between.

As the group has grown, so has the amount of moderation required to keep it running.

The reality is that I spend a lot of time in this community, but most of that time is spent behind the scenes dealing with moderation, approving links, reviewing reports, cleaning up issues, and generally keeping things moving.

Truthfully, I would like to spend more of that time working on the new Solder Joint Junction platform. The goal there is to solve some of the actual recurring problems we see in the group by creating better educational resources, organizing information more effectively, helping people find tools and equipment, and building something bigger around the community as a whole.

The problem is simple. Every week a huge amount of my available time gets eaten by moderation.

So with that being said, I need some help.

What This Role Actually Looks Like

I want to set expectations properly because most people have the wrong idea about moderation.

Approximately 90% of this role is approving links.

Reddit absolutely loves filtering links. Vendor websites, suppliers, educational resources, documentation, and countless legitimate links get caught constantly.

Most people have no idea how many links end up in the moderation queue every week until they actually see it. Once you do, it becomes pretty obvious how quickly things can get out of control.

This role is much more janitorial than authoritative.

The other 10% is reviewing reports, helping identify obvious harassment, cleaning up the occasional issue, and helping maintain the overall tone of the community.

What I'm Looking For

• Calm and professional people
• People who understand the culture of the community
• People who can identify obvious harassment, trolling, and bad-faith behavior
• People who are willing to help keep the moderation queue under control
• People who understand that moderation is about helping the community, not becoming the center of attention

Moderator Terms

These roles will last approximately 6 months.

This is intentional.

First and foremost, this is a volunteer role. I don't want people feeling like they're signing up for a lifetime appointment. Rotating moderators helps prevent burnout, keeps things fresh, and gives other community members an opportunity to step up if they want to become a bigger part of the community.

Second, there is a much bigger project happening behind the scenes than most people probably realize.

As the platform grows, I need to build a larger pool of trusted people around it. Rotating moderators gives me the opportunity to get to know more members of the community, see how they communicate, how they handle responsibility, and whether they are people I may want to work with on larger projects in the future.

Expectations

• Zoom interview required
• Webcam required
• No anonymous applications
• One moderator meeting per month over Zoom

The monthly meeting is simply a chance for moderators to tell me what they're seeing inside the community. Trends, recurring issues, feedback, ideas, and things that may need attention. The goal is to keep communication open and help me understand what is happening from multiple perspectives.

I personally know every moderator who works with me. I know who they are, where they are from, and what kind of person they are.

If you are an amazing moderator but wish to remain anonymous, I completely respect that, but this is not the place for you.

Activity Expectations

The monthly moderator meeting is casual and voluntary. Nobody is being forced to attend meetings, perform work, or participate beyond what they are comfortable contributing.

This is a volunteer role, and I want people to enjoy being part of the community rather than feeling like they have taken on a second job.

That being said, moderation positions are intended for people who actively want to contribute.

If a moderator goes 30 days without taking a moderation action of any kind, they will likely be removed and replaced by someone else who is looking for an opportunity to help.

This is not intended as a punishment. It is simply a practical reality of running a growing community. There are usually more people interested in helping than there are moderation positions available, so I want those positions occupied by people who are actively participating.

Life happens. People get busy. Interests change. There are no hard feelings if someone steps away.

Apply Here

https://forms.gle/kZspN9xxk65bD4qT6

If you're selected, I'll reach out directly to schedule a Zoom interview.

If you don't receive a reply, it simply means you weren't selected for this round.

Privacy

All information submitted through the application form will be used solely for reviewing moderator applications.

Once 2 moderators have been selected, all applicant information will be deleted unless you specifically request that it be kept on hand for future opportunities.

Your information will never be sold, shared, distributed, or provided to any third party for any reason.

I appreciate everyone who continues to help others learn and grow here.

The goal is simple. Keep this community a place where people can ask questions, learn new skills, share information, and improve themselves without being attacked for trying.

THIS POST IS CONTINUALLY A WORK IN PROGRESS, PLEASE COMMENT SUGGESTIONS

This is a list of recommendations separated by budget, intended to be accessible and easy for people looking for a new station.

I would like this to be a community effort. If you have any stations you would like me to add/consider/avoid then, please comment, I will check every comment. If you have any questions, please ask as well.

Every station on this list I have researched and verified is a good product with no major drawbacks, and will work well. There is nothing on the recommended sections that is unsafe or has serious issues. Except the T12 (£0-50 bracket) stations which users report can often come with an ungrounded (unsafe) case. I've given a warning for this and a video on how to fix it, or to not buy these stations. You are of course free to check this yourself. I have spent probably 100-200 hours researching and discussing with people on this sub.

I will not be going into detail on each product, these are not reviews.

✍ Reasons for making this guide:

• Recommendation posts are answered daily about what soldering station to buy, and the exact same post will be created 12 hours later. Tired of posting the same paragraphs explaining T12 vs C245, good options, grounding, accessories, etc.
• Unsafe stations are often being recommended to beginners. Stations like the FNIRSI DWS-200, which has been reported to have 90V of voltage leak, and requires fixing by the user. Or the Aifen A9E which has voltage leak and is also often recommended.
• Some of the recommendations are simply ass, or uninformed, or often massively biased.

🎒Why no portable irons?

Three main reasons:

1. They are worse value, more expensive, offer less performance, less variety of tips/handles and are not ergonomic. The advantage is they take little space and can be portable. However, If you are looking at a station in the first place, you have the space for a full station.
2. People say portables are cheaper do not factor in the 130W+ chargers that can actually power them properly. Total the cost and you could have gotten yourself a quality C210/C245 station that will last you years and be more powerful, reliable and ergonomic.
3. I will eventually make a separate list for portables.

🇨🇳 Chinese Stations vs 🇺🇸 "Good" Brands

I think it's important to start with this because there's always comments arguing about it. Most equipment related posts are divided into two groups:

• People who discourage anyone from buying chinese/clone brands due to possible quality issues, grounding issues, no electrical certification and inferior internal parts leading to worse reliability
• People who discourage anyone from buying stations from genuine brands on account of having inferior features, worse performance, worse user experience, and can at many times perform worse than clone stations while being multiple times more expensive.

Both of these groups are correct. You will often find JBC clone stations with proper grounding, great performance and no reported QC issues that can be found for 1/10 of the price of the authentic JBC station. Will the clone last you as long as the JBC? Probably not. Is it still good value? Very much so.

You can also find clone stations that will fry every component you touch and will die within 6 months. That's what this post is for.

What should you buy? That's up to you. If you value long term use and see yourself soldering daily, for multiple hours, reliability is most likely more important to you. If you solder occasionally and want the best performance possible for as little money as possible, then perhaps the clone stations are for you. Most clone stations will still last you 3+ years.

❗IMPORTANT❗- Soldering Tips:

A tip/cartridge is what you actually touch the board with, and heat up in order to solder. You insert this into your handle, which connects to the station. These are not cross compatible across stations. You cannot insert a T12 tip into a C245 station (unless explicity stated, some stations are made for this).

There are different types of tips, and tip sizes within those standards. It's important to understand them before buying a station, as they have different prices and may not be readily available in your region.

Tip Types (T12 vs JBC C245/C210):

Most options on here will be either T12 or JBC C245/C210 tips. Genuine T12 tips from brands like Hakko are cheaper than JBC tips (£8 vs £20 per tip), but don't provide equal heating to JBC tips.

However, in reality anything you can get done with a JBC tip you can get done with a T12. But if your budget allows for it you should always lean towards JBC tips.

Genuine vs Clone Tips

Clone tips can be bought for both platforms, and most clones have gotten good enough to the point where they can be used with no issues. But genuine is always better. Clone tips usually wear out slightly faster. However clone tips are usually available in far more regions, so may be a good alternative.

Tip/Handle Size:

Mostly relevant to JBC tip compatible stations. There are three main sizes that JBC compatible handles and stations use: C115, C210, C245.

• C245 is the standard, and will be enough for large components or micro soldering tasks. Anything from 5mm chisel tips to 0.4mm conicals.
• C210 is exclusively intended for micro soldering, and has a maximum of 40W peak power, vs 135W of the C245. Will struggle with any large component
• C115 is intended for basically the smallest, microscopic components you can get. Most people never need to consider this option

🔧 Accessories

Many people will not look at accessories that come with the station. However, some stations on here will often come with stands, these automatically place your tip on standby and lower the temperature. Or other accessories like spare tips, spare handles, grounding cables, brass wool, tip swap tools and more. This can easily save money equal to the station itself in accessories. A good stand goes for £15-20.

⚠️ DO NOT BUY ⚠️

• FNIRSI DWS-200 - up to 90V voltage leak on tip, needs modification for proper grounding, users on eevblog still say the station is unsafe for multiple reasons. This has been addressed in a video by nanofix here. The issue is not as big as originally thought, but it could still damage very, very sensitive components. However newer revisions which are completely fixed are already being sold, so it will be added to the recommended list in due time. I would look at alternatives for now, many users are still receiving the old model with bad grounding as sellers try to get rid of old stock.
• Aixun T3A/T3AS - 1-10V tip voltage leak, thermal runaway, kills tips
• Aixun T3B/T3BS - 1-10V tip voltage leak, thermal runaway, kills tips
• Aixun T320 - 1-10v tip voltage leak, thermal runaway fixed compared to T3A. Newer units might have fixed this issue, but keeping it in this section for now.
• AIFEN (not sugon) A9/A9E - 9V+ voltage leak (might be fixed on newer units). Although Sugon should have the same flaws, there is nothing online about the Sugon having voltage leak. There are multiple reports that it is properly grounded however. So I am not including it.
• KSGER T12 - voltage leak, non grounded case, even on newer 3.1 units, unlike the Quecoo units
• Quecoo 952/955 - voltage leak, non grounded case
• KSGER C245 - all units have a non grounded case. shame as the station is great otherwise. give it a look if you don't mind jumping some cables around.
• YIHUA 862BD+/902A - Bad all in one station with a blower fan in the handle for the hot air, and passive heated tips with an awful big handle.
• YIHUA 926 III - Beginner trap, bad passive heated tip, useless accessories. Get yourself one of the T12 stations instead.
• Any Soldering Iron that plugs straight into the wall outlet.
• Any cheap 2-in-1/all in one stations with a hot air (unless it is expensive and with a good hot air and iron, which is rare). These often have a bad hot air and bad iron, when you could buy two much better separate products. Mostly traps newbies and beginners.
• Any cheap amazon stations that come with attached PCB holders, cheap solder, cheap passive heated tips.

❔Not Enough Info

• OSS T245 - no info about it yet
• OSS T210 - no info about it yet
• Thermaltronics 1000S - Very new, and most likely good quality but absolutely 0 info online that anyone has actually used one yet. Will wait for reviews to confirm it lives up to the 2000S/9000S.
• Alientek T300B - Looks like a good dual channel option. It's 160W so most likely can do C245 and C210 at the same time, but not 2 C245 at the same time. If a review comes out about it confirming there's no issues, I will add it to the list.
• Quick 202D - Someone recommended this in the comments, but there's almost no info about it online. If you have any reviews/opinions about it, let me know.

⭐ - This star indicates my overall recommendation for each price bracket.

⚠️❗Warning❗⚠️

Because of the bad quality control in these T12 stations, some users say their units are case grounded, other people say they are not. Please check once you receive your station if your case is grounded, if not, fix it with a jumper cable (guides can be found on eevblog/youtube depending on station). If you do not want to risk it, I recommend saving and buying the slightly more expensive stations in the £50-100 bracket.

Video guide to grounding

£0-50 Price Bracket

💰 £50-100 Price Bracket

💰💰 £100-200 Price Bracket

Note: this is a weird category. Technically you can get everything in this section from the slightly cheaper C245/C210 stations, so make sure when buying one of these you've done your research.

💰💰💰 £200+

note: I'm recommending the pace due to the amazing value it provides, but anything in this bracket will last a lifetime (maybe not the aixun) and have amazing performance.

🛍️ Where do I buy the station?

Once you have decided on a station, I have provided Item IDs for the products which can be found on Aliexpress. I cannot add direct links as reddit removes any post with Ali links inside of them. Here is how to use the Item ID

1. Go to the website, and click on any aliexpress item
2. Replace the item id in the website URL with the one I have given next to each product
3. Remove any text in the url after "(the item id).html". This way the link ends with "(the item id).html". This will then lead you to the item.

For items without a link, I either have not added it yet, which means you will have to look for it by yourself on Ali, sort by most popular and pick from sellers with high sales and reviews.

DO NOT BUY FROM SELLERS WITH NO SALES AND REVIEWS.

For for branded items such as Metcal/JBC/Thermaltronics, they can be bought from local electronics distributors which you can find on their official websites by searching phrases like "metcal distributors", and finding your country/continent. Don't buy these brands off Aliexpress, you will most likely pay more than you should or get a clone.

📝 Final Notes

Finally, it is also important that you can get many of the more expensive options for much, much cheaper on sites like eBay. eBay has 30 days return warranty, and guaranteed return if the item isn't working as described. I've seen "untested" JBC-CB stations that turn on and clearly work go for as little as £100 because people don't check. Before buying a budget option, have a look to see if you can get yourself a good deal.

I have been working on this for about a month. I hope it helps someone.

Happy soldering!

(reposted because reddit removed for aliexpress links)