How to Use a Hot Air Rework Station
Joel_E_B
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What's It Good For?
Hot-air rework stations can be very handy. As mentioned above, they are a crucial tool when it comes to reworking a board. The term rework just means you are refinishing or repairing an already reflowed board, and it is a term commonly used in the electronics world. Just think of it as doing any work to the board that wasn't involved in the actual production process. Here are some common rework scenarios:
Polarized Components - Parts that have been placed incorrectly (backwards, shifted x degrees off). These include ICs, diodes, some capacitors, connectors, etc.
Tombstone Parts - This is when a part (usually a resistor or capacitor) reflows only on one side. The part usually sticks strait up resembling a tombstone.
Cold Joints - This is similar to a tombstone except the parts might not be sticking strait up, making it harder to see the connection that is not being made.
Removing Defective Parts - Sometimes, during the IC manufacturing process, errors can arise and go unnoticed. These ICs are then placed on perfectly good PCBs. Hot-air is great for replacing these bad parts.
Missing Components - The smaller the component, the easier it is for it to disappear. This can happen before or during reflow, resulting in a spot where something should be, but isn't. Hot-airing a new part in its place is a snap with this rework station.
Unintentional Solder Jumpers - If too much solder or solder paste is used, the result can be jumpers on one or more of your surface mount IC's legs. Hot-air can sometimes be used in conjunction with a flux pen to remove these pesky buggers.