Agbara Life - Soldering Badges

Let’s learn to solder creating your very own circuit board badge.

What we’re making

Today we’re learning about Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs). These are the same green boards that are in your cell phones and computers. Inside the layers of the board are copper traces and a thick material called Fiberglass. PCBs allow us to take the thousands of wires we would need to create a computer, and make it small enough to fit into your hand.

Soldering is the process of heating a special metal that turns into a liquid while heated. The special metal turns back into a solid when it cools. This means that soldering can help make electrical connections between the copper inside the PCB and the components we will be using today.

Safety

Soldering is a fun activity, but safety is critical to making sure we all can make our badges.

Soldering Iron: This is the main tool we will use. Soldering Irons get very hot

Safety Glasses: must be worn when at the soldering station. This helps to protect our eyes from anything unexpected.


Soldering - First Actions

Before the Stations are Turned on

Adjust the temperature of the soldering irons. They should all be at the lowest temperature. This helps to prevent the burning smell and possible burns wont hurt as much.

Step 1: Get used to holding the soldering iron

Tell the students

Alright class, now listen to me first, and then when I say go you can try it. The first step is to take the soldering iron out of dock, breathe for a second, and put it back in the dock. We are just getting used to the motion.

Step 2: get used to cleaning the soldering iron

Next we’re going to take the soldering iron out. wipe it off into the gold sponge, and put it back into the dock.

No it doesn’t have to be too hard. Just about three times to clean off the tip. This helps reduce the burning smell.

step 3: get used to touching soldering iron and solder together

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Key things

Correct improper behavior now. Students holding the soldering iron wrong,

Make sure the station has everything in reach. The soldering iron, mat, and gold sponge should all be within arms length. Reaching is not good.

Pull a student that’s not taking it seriously. There are twenty of them and forty minutes. They can be put last in the queue, and it’s harder to manage.


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Soldering Flow

The flow goes as follows:

  1. A resistor at the bottom

    1. Make sure they use the two holes close to each other, and not try to jump from one to another.

  2. a resistor at the side

  3. the battery holder

  4. the LED

    1. (the only component they can get the wrong orientation, so we do it last and have them check before they solder).

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Soldering the

Battery Holder

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Soldering the LED

The LED is the only component that needs to be orientated the right way. We call this “polarization”.

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Volunteer Checks

About 5 minutes in, you will start to see some of the following

  • Students just burning solder - Remind them to no do that and they will not get any more

  • Students not putting the soldering irons back in the dock

    • Done often when trying to ask questions, or ask for help.

  • Students forgetting the dock gets hot too

  • Students reaching over each other around the soldering irons.