It's really really good
I had another brand/version of this same thing that my father gave me when he no longer needed it and I just assumed that all butane soldering Iron/Heat guns were just not that good. Well this one changed my mind on that assumption. It's actually very useful and convenient and I've found myself reaching for it for times where I would have begrudgingly pulled out the extension cord and plugged in my desktop soldering iron for times I was soldering off of a workbench. I'll break down the bad things about the other one and how this one fixes those gripes so you can look out for some of these downsides of other brands/styles. 1. One handed operation!!! There are times where you can't just sit this thing down and let it run and the other brand required that you pull this little safety stopper down and then press the button to ignite it. It was impossible to do with one hand and you wouldn't believe the amount of times that you only have one hand free. The operation on the Berkling is absolutely perfect. Slide the switch, click to ignite and you're off. Very easy to operate with one hand and it fires on the first click every. single. time. 2. Ergonomics: The previous version that I had was more of a "gun" style and that just isn't a very natural way to solder. Holding the device like a pen or pencil makes much more sense and feels much more natural in my hand resulting in better solder joints and better overall experience. 3. Heat dissipation: An unfortunate reality with these devices is that the heat has to vent somewhere. To my surprise it seems that Berkling actually thought this through though. My previous device had vent holes on all sides of the tip near the end that you solder with. This one chose one side to vent from and let me tell you it makes a HUGE difference. I could hardly use the other one because it's often that you're soldering in a tight spot, or you have other wires close by and the exhaust heat would burn the wires, prematurely shrink tubing, burn a nearby surface etc etc. With the Berkling you are able to purposefully aim the exhaust temperatures in a direction that makes the most sense, away from anything that might get burned. This is a major plus for me and a feature that I wasn't even looking out for but it makes the quality of life using this thing 10 fold better. 4. Did I mention it fires the first time everytime! No more *click click click*...listen...*click click click*...listen 5.The price. Whoa... didn't know that one this cheap could be this good. The one that I had before was more than double the price but apparently you were paying for the useless extra tips and the case that it came with. Complaints: 1. The soldering tip is pretty bad. It gets the job done I guess but it's hard to tin and seems like the chrome coating on it needs to be rubbed off or worn down before you get a surface that can be tinned. I might be missing something with this as I've never had a soldering tip that you need to do anything to other than just start using it but this is one of the worse ones that i've used. There is a spot on it that I can't get to tin to save my life, it just beads up and rolls off like water on a duck's back. I'm thinking about maybe scuffing it up with sandpaper or something. 2. No extra tips, and no clear place to buy any even if I wanted to. It would be nice to have spare tips, different size/shape tips, maybe a heat shield attachment for shrink tubing, etc. But I don't really know how to go about getting extra tips or attachments. I'm assuming that this thread pitch/size is used on other devices but it's going to require a lot more research than I'd like to figure it all out. 3. No case to speak of. I don't like just throwing my devices in a drawer or leaving them laying around. I would have been nice to have some sort of little case to put the device in. It does have a sleeve that protects the tip that you slide on but nothing that protects the more vulnerable switches/plastic. I don't know if this exists in any product but it would be nice to be able to somehow have the ability to switch from soldering to heat gun.... solder a joint, slide the shrink tubing over and heat gun it... but the tip is too hot to be able to pull it off without some extra tools and annoyance. Again, I don't know how you would fix this issue but it's something that would be nice if someone figured out. For now I use the afore mentioned heat vents to shrink the tubing, which works quite well, just with much less precision. Overall, VERY happy with the price to quality/feature set ratio. Would definitely recommend this one. Read more