Hot Air Stations

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Good day everyone!
I’m wanting to up my arsenal and add a hot air station to my kit.
On eBay all I see is Chinese gear which worries me but I don’t want to invest in a hakko unit as it’s only for home tinkering.
Can anyone recommend a reasonably priced unit?

Thank all

2

Hey Jeff,

I happen to know we have one coming online soon that isn’t as good as the Hakko (slower to heat up, less consistant heat) but does the job for tinkering, 240V and AU certifications. It’s going to be around $140. I can add you to be notified when that is available if you like

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If you watch Big Clive on YouTube, he has dissected several Chinese hot air and soldering stations and seems to think they are reasonably okay. Sure, they may not be a robust as genuine Hakko units, but they are a heckuva lot cheaper and still pretty reliable. I have a Yihua 8786D I purchased from an Australian eBay seller for around $90 and it hasn’t given me any problems to date.

Of course, buying off eBay or Aliexpress comes with a whole 'other bunch of risks - Parcels get delayed or damaged in the post and you then have to fight with eBay and/or the seller to get compensation. If anything breaks you quite often have no chance of getting it fixed or replaced. And worst of all, when you buy something off eBay, you are never really sure what (if anything) you will actually get. You pays your money, you takes your chances…

If Core are getting a unit soon it might be worth waiting to see the specs and you will then be able to trust the support of the good people here should anything go wrong.

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Yeah I’ll hang on and see what Core have.
Thanks for the replies

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