My handle (plastic version) with blue wire and black wire were broken after using for 1 month. I found the strain relief is not working therefore wires were pulled off. Your video is very helpful.
No the Weller station I keeping as it has also direct active tip, but use it for mostly micro SMD work as have the active tweezers. I needed one for through hole as repair a lot of vintage stuff as tube radios, amps, reel to reel and arcade boards. This one I got to replace my older style WXP120 Solder Pencil, 120W, as had older style tips where tip go over heating element and those tips for the most part are hard to get anymore. This one is way better and way faster in recovery. With the other one would have to wait a few seconds when it when to standby 200c to heat up and had a hard time with large ground planes and heatsinks. This one heat up as soon as I lift the handle and is up in temperature, no wait pretty much. Plus calibrated it, so now is dead on temperature and shows you real time temp. It handle heatsinks and larger components overall with ease. I already have T12 tips I use at work and cheap to get. The station is better the hakko fx951 I use at work as has way more features and shows real time with shorter tip to board distance. If only the QC their stuff? I replaced a quad flat pack IC with it today on a arcade board and did it with ease in a couple of second with that BCM3 tip drag soldering it, it took me longer to remove the chip with hot air, then soldering it back to the board. That tip is great. I did try the Pace ads200 as was only $220, but ended up returning it twice as first one was defective and second one did poor on tests and half the tips didn't work literally I had some that came up to temp and then stopped working and did poorly just unsoldering a heat sink from a board. Plus you can not flip the tip over as direction one way insert. Plus the Pace would overshoot by 40c reason it doesn't show real temp, the Ksger doesn't and does great in keeping temperature about 5c regulation even when heavily loaded. Despite the typical Chinese factory QC problems this Ksger had, this one way better bang for the buck and yes you can use genuine Hakko tips as well. Have 6 hours on it already and going to be pretty much my daily driver. If you have to choose from older style tip design, vs direct tip this is the station to get without spending $500 plus on one. You just have to work out the safety and QC issues, you won't want to go back to the older style once you use direct active tip, it is that much better when it come to thermal recovery. It uses a STM 32 bit Arm Cortex micro MCU which is using a 3rd party open source software that matured and most bugs like the copper heat dissipation on linear regulator been worked out. Just make sure you buy one with 2.01, or 2.1S hardware version, avoid the 2.0 version. Uses a continuous high current mosfet for switching, instead of the triac the older cheaper solder station use that are known to fail. So it is a good one, as they are sort of using what newer JBC and Pace uses as they also use a mosfet for switching. Don't bother going with the more expensive 150w version of the t12 station, the tips are designed for 75 watts and seen issue with people that have the more expensive 150w JABE station having tips burn up quickly due to they are over-driving them, no they are not t12 tips. 75 watts is perfect for the t12/t15 tips and all that needed and is the sweet spot pretty much. Avoid the PACE ads200 there are a few major design flaws with it and may do a video explaining them if I get another one as still have the tips. It did poorly on tests and didn't have the power to remove a heatsink as tips are not as good as the t12/t15 tips are. Not sure why people recommend it to be honest, it was that bad and waited and tried the revised one as they did revise it after complaints from a few people. Stick with the t12/t15 as they are proven and been around for many years and better tip selection overall. Just don't bother with the knife one that come with the station and invest in good tips. I already have a few of them as use them at work. The orginal Hakko are 12 to 15 bucks and the Ksger tips which are pretty good are about 5 to 9 bucks each, which both is what I been using over the years. I have yet to come across a defective tip.
did you ever get the carbon handle? how do you like it compared to the black one if you did? thanks i have the blue plastic ones and the black aluminum one and im thinking about the carbon one but not sure if its worth it
@@thetechgenie7374 I do also. I ended up buying one to try it and I much prefer the solid black aluminum one I have all of the different ones now and that is my favorite.
My Ksger K12 died, the hand piece had broken a wire off the motion sensor. The wires were all visiable through the strain relief, but i had not seen this video to realize i should have reworked that spot. when the motion sensor stopped working i was in the middle of a Amp project and could push the start button to get the iron hot in 8 seconds. Upon disassembly it was clear to see the blue wire had broken off. i reattached it to find the black wire had also broken off. i was testing the motion sensor with the handle disassembled and heard an arc from the broken black wire touching the red wire. i found where the black wire came off next to the white wire so i reconnected it. However, upon reassembly the head unit continued to show ERROR. i thought that was likely the restart process like when it was new. But then the tip took off and became cherry red. I shut it down. changed tips and restarted once again the new tip became cherry red. It would seen the thermistor has failed or its circuit. I ordered a new KSGER Alum handle. Hoping it will fix this issue, but I am concerned the short that occurred after the black wire broke off and shorted on the red wire, maybe have fried a component handling the temp circuit. If so where would take this unit?? Made in China, took me months to receive it and even after all the positive reviews, the strain relief fails to protect the skinny wired connections. I am really worried, I am retired and money is not easy to spend on hobby tools. Any ideas welcome. Dennis in Virginia
Thanks for this. I had read somewhere that the plastic handled one you got with your kit had an issue when people were using them for long periods of time, although that post was not specific about the issue (but seemed to imply that that is why many of the new stations come with the old style handle with the retaining ring and sleeve). Have you used the plastic handle like you used the metal one and did you find it getting too hot or other issues? I had gotten the SS handle with mine because of another UA-camr who had an issue with the black handle being too tight, otherwise, I probably would have gotten the black handled one. I found the exact issue with the SS one you did. There's no positive click to say your far enough or to secure the tip and I ended up pushing the tip too far and pushing the guts out the back, so I saw your review because I'm hoping to get a better handle.
The black handle I had no issues with it being to tight and clicks in fine. I use that one mainly and for hours at a time. The plastic blue one had it where the tip fall out easily, but fixed it as connection base wasn’t screw in all the way and wiring issue from factory. Been fine since, but prefer the black handle and is the one I use mainly.
@@thetechgenie7374 Wow, thank you for the quick response. I appreciate your doing this video and "taking one for the team" when it comes to testing the various handles. I had tried to find any info. I could on the various handles to see what was recommended, but could not find too much info. (not sure how this video got missed). Most of the reviews of the soldering station revolve around the plastic handle and I only found one on the black metal handle.
I have the carbon fiber handle you show at 5:02 and honestly I'm disappointed in it. The white plastic sleeve inside that holds the tip secure (or rather, is supposed to) deformed after only a few uses and now tips slip forward and lose contact every time I clean the tip or pop it back into the handle holder on my caddy. If the internal sleeves were replaceable that would be a big benefit, as I love the feel of the handle, but it just doesn't hold the tips well enough.
Subscribed, you sound so matter of fact and stright to the point, thank you for making this video, it helps newbies a lot.
My handle (plastic version) with blue wire and black wire were broken after using for 1 month. I found the strain relief is not working therefore wires were pulled off. Your video is very helpful.
Good video what to look for and how to do some simple repair/corrective measures. Say did you replace your Weller unit? Keith
No the Weller station I keeping as it has also direct active tip, but use it for mostly micro SMD work as have the active tweezers. I needed one for through hole as repair a lot of vintage stuff as tube radios, amps, reel to reel and arcade boards. This one I got to replace my older style WXP120 Solder Pencil, 120W, as had older style tips where tip go over heating element and those tips for the most part are hard to get anymore. This one is way better and way faster in recovery. With the other one would have to wait a few seconds when it when to standby 200c to heat up and had a hard time with large ground planes and heatsinks. This one heat up as soon as I lift the handle and is up in temperature, no wait pretty much. Plus calibrated it, so now is dead on temperature and shows you real time temp. It handle heatsinks and larger components overall with ease. I already have T12 tips I use at work and cheap to get. The station is better the hakko fx951 I use at work as has way more features and shows real time with shorter tip to board distance. If only the QC their stuff?
I replaced a quad flat pack IC with it today on a arcade board and did it with ease in a couple of second with that BCM3 tip drag soldering it, it took me longer to remove the chip with hot air, then soldering it back to the board. That tip is great.
I did try the Pace ads200 as was only $220, but ended up returning it twice as first one was defective and second one did poor on tests and half the tips didn't work literally I had some that came up to temp and then stopped working and did poorly just unsoldering a heat sink from a board. Plus you can not flip the tip over as direction one way insert. Plus the Pace would overshoot by 40c reason it doesn't show real temp, the Ksger doesn't and does great in keeping temperature about 5c regulation even when heavily loaded.
Despite the typical Chinese factory QC problems this Ksger had, this one way better bang for the buck and yes you can use genuine Hakko tips as well. Have 6 hours on it already and going to be pretty much my daily driver. If you have to choose from older style tip design, vs direct tip this is the station to get without spending $500 plus on one. You just have to work out the safety and QC issues, you won't want to go back to the older style once you use direct active tip, it is that much better when it come to thermal recovery. It uses a STM 32 bit Arm Cortex micro MCU which is using a 3rd party open source software that matured and most bugs like the copper heat dissipation on linear regulator been worked out. Just make sure you buy one with 2.01, or 2.1S hardware version, avoid the 2.0 version. Uses a continuous high current mosfet for switching, instead of the triac the older cheaper solder station use that are known to fail. So it is a good one, as they are sort of using what newer JBC and Pace uses as they also use a mosfet for switching. Don't bother going with the more expensive 150w version of the t12 station, the tips are designed for 75 watts and seen issue with people that have the more expensive 150w JABE station having tips burn up quickly due to they are over-driving them, no they are not t12 tips. 75 watts is perfect for the t12/t15 tips and all that needed and is the sweet spot pretty much. Avoid the PACE ads200 there are a few major design flaws with it and may do a video explaining them if I get another one as still have the tips. It did poorly on tests and didn't have the power to remove a heatsink as tips are not as good as the t12/t15 tips are. Not sure why people recommend it to be honest, it was that bad and waited and tried the revised one as they did revise it after complaints from a few people. Stick with the t12/t15 as they are proven and been around for many years and better tip selection overall. Just don't bother with the knife one that come with the station and invest in good tips. I already have a few of them as use them at work. The orginal Hakko are 12 to 15 bucks and the Ksger tips which are pretty good are about 5 to 9 bucks each, which both is what I been using over the years. I have yet to come across a defective tip.
did you ever get the carbon handle? how do you like it compared to the black one if you did? thanks i have the blue plastic ones and the black aluminum one and im thinking about the carbon one but not sure if its worth it
I did get the carbon one. I prefer the black one over it.
@@thetechgenie7374 I do also. I ended up buying one to try it and I much prefer the solid black aluminum one I have all of the different ones now and that is my favorite.
Have you tried any other handles for the ksger t12? Which would you rather use currently? Thanks alot for the review
Hi, Will the warm-up time be faster if we increase the voltage of the smps source inside the soldering iron?
My Ksger K12 died, the hand piece had broken a wire off the motion sensor. The wires were all visiable through the strain relief, but i had not seen this video to realize i should have reworked that spot. when the motion sensor stopped working i was in the middle of a Amp project and could push the start button to get the iron hot in 8 seconds. Upon disassembly it was clear to see the blue wire had broken off. i reattached it to find the black wire had also broken off. i was testing the motion sensor with the handle disassembled and heard an arc from the broken black wire touching the red wire. i found where the black wire came off next to the white wire so i reconnected it. However, upon reassembly the head unit continued to show ERROR. i thought that was likely the restart process like when it was new. But then the tip took off and became cherry red. I shut it down. changed tips and restarted once again the new tip became cherry red. It would seen the thermistor has failed or its circuit. I ordered a new KSGER Alum handle. Hoping it will fix this issue, but I am concerned the short that occurred after the black wire broke off and shorted on the red wire, maybe have fried a component handling the temp circuit. If so where would take this unit?? Made in China, took me months to receive it and even after all the positive reviews, the strain relief fails to protect the skinny wired connections. I am really worried, I am retired and money is not easy to spend on hobby tools. Any ideas welcome. Dennis in Virginia
Thank you very much for beautiful video.
Thanks for this. I had read somewhere that the plastic handled one you got with your kit had an issue when people were using them for long periods of time, although that post was not specific about the issue (but seemed to imply that that is why many of the new stations come with the old style handle with the retaining ring and sleeve). Have you used the plastic handle like you used the metal one and did you find it getting too hot or other issues? I had gotten the SS handle with mine because of another UA-camr who had an issue with the black handle being too tight, otherwise, I probably would have gotten the black handled one. I found the exact issue with the SS one you did. There's no positive click to say your far enough or to secure the tip and I ended up pushing the tip too far and pushing the guts out the back, so I saw your review because I'm hoping to get a better handle.
The black handle I had no issues with it being to tight and clicks in fine. I use that one mainly and for hours at a time. The plastic blue one had it where the tip fall out easily, but fixed it as connection base wasn’t screw in all the way and wiring issue from factory. Been fine since, but prefer the black handle and is the one I use mainly.
The black one the one to get out of all of them, it does get warm, but not hot and doesn’t bother me.
@@thetechgenie7374 Wow, thank you for the quick response. I appreciate your doing this video and "taking one for the team" when it comes to testing the various handles. I had tried to find any info. I could on the various handles to see what was recommended, but could not find too much info. (not sure how this video got missed). Most of the reviews of the soldering station revolve around the plastic handle and I only found one on the black metal handle.
I have the carbon fiber handle you show at 5:02 and honestly I'm disappointed in it. The white plastic sleeve inside that holds the tip secure (or rather, is supposed to) deformed after only a few uses and now tips slip forward and lose contact every time I clean the tip or pop it back into the handle holder on my caddy. If the internal sleeves were replaceable that would be a big benefit, as I love the feel of the handle, but it just doesn't hold the tips well enough.