Hakko FR-300 Desoldering Tool

Lets fix 99¢ thrift shop VCR/DVD Player
jeffescortlx 3 minute excerpt starting at the 8 minute mark

Warms the frozen cockles of me heart to see this guy bringing this old electronical gizmo back to life. It's entertaining when you are awake in the middle of the night because you can't sleep, but the reason it's here is because of this gizmo:

Hakko FR-300 Desoldering Tool

I have repaired a couple of circuit boards* where I used a manually operated solder sucker, and those things are a pain to use. This gadget would have been wonderful except for the $300 price tag. There is no way I would have spent that much money for a tool I would likely use only a dozen times. But it's nice to see there is enough electronic repair business being done to justify the existence of this product.

300

The FR-300 has been superseded by the FR-301, but 301 just doesn't have the same ring to it as 300. I can just imagine the advertising announcer telling you to get your EF AR THREE HUNDRED today.

Electronics repair has got to be very odd business. Most electronic gizmos aren't worth the time it takes to open the case, and if they pass that hurdle you still have to sort out what went wrong and then find the parts. Sometimes the damage is visible, like in the above video, but sometimes it is invisible, like when the inside of a microchip fails. If the parts are common, you can probably get them from Digi-Key. If they are special, they might cost more the the gizmo is worth. I suppose that's why you don't see many electronic repair shops around any more.

*I remember using a solder sucker on a few occasions, but I can't remember whether that led to an actual repair. I might have just been fooling around.