Aoyue 474A++ 80 Watt Digital Desoldering Station with Built-in Vacuum Pump

I had been looking into getting a desoldering station to replace faulty ICs and other through-hole components when needed . After lots of searching and reading reviews, this seemed to be the best choice and I can honestly say this is a great product for the price. Ive since used it on several occasions and it works great. The tip heats up relatively quickly (about 30 secs) and after getting used to using the gun, you can desolder an IC really quickly which is a HUGE improvement over the cheap soldapult products. Here is a list of what the unit comes with:- The station/unit itself- The gun attachment- Power cable- Gun holder- Silicon grease in a syringe with no push handle- 5 sponge filters- 2 spring filters- 3 nozzles in different sizes- Cleaning tool- Cleaning drill bit + handle- 2 spring filter bases- DocumentationEverything comes packaged neatly in plastic and cardboard. The documentation is actually pretty good despite this being a chinese made unit that would normally contain broken english in the user manual. While using it to desolder, pulling the trigger on the gun activates the pump in the base unit which sucks the solder into the filters in the gun. This desoldering station works surprisingly well for a chinese made product. I do have some small issues with it although it should be considered nit picking. Its just to make you aware of what to expect- Using this requires constant maintenance. You really do have to constantly clean the filters after desoldering several components. This is to be expected, but its something to take into consideration. As long as you keep the filters maintained, it works great.- The display is only shows temperature in Centigrade. For people in the US, this is slightly annoying but its not a big deal.- If you need to change the tip to a smaller/larger size, it requires almost completely disassembling the gun. Another minor annoyance to be aware of.- The syringe of silicon grease that is used to lubricate the spring filter doesn't come with a push handle. I had to use a pen to push the plug in the syringe to get the grease out. This is just a minor annoyance.I took the unit apart to inspect the build quality inside and to make sure the outlet is grounded properly. Everything inside looks great. The soldering quality on the circuit board is good and all disconnects and soldering joints on the wires are protected by rubber grommets. The wires are neatly organized as well. The build quality is very good. I took lots of pictures and attached them to this review so be sure to check them out.Overall, this is a great product for the price and you cant go wrong with it if your looking into getting a desoldering station

For its price it does the work most of the time. For thru holes with a lot of solder you will need to either use in on both sides or run another soldering iron in the back so that the hole can be cleared well enough to install another component. Got my job done with some back up from the soldering iron to melt both sides of the solder. Much easier than the desoldering braid ( which did nothing) or my old hand pump which requires another person or an octopus for operation

Works great! As others have posted, the filters that come with the unit are absolute rubbish. Pick up the following Hakko filter replacements: Hakko A1033, Hakko A1009, Hakko A1030. As these are a consumable item, I picked up the 10 pack of each. You will need to keep using the sponge mesh 'filter' at the unit screw in to insure the nice Hakko filter stays put. The Hakko A1030 metal spring filters are longer and solder doesn't stick to them. It works so much nicer than the included one.As far as suction goes, it puts out a powerful suction that collects solder nicely. From reviews on youtube, I am aware that this unit will go to sleep on you (requires a button press on the unit to wake up) due to how they wired the upgraded pump. It also runs the pump power directly off the desoldering gun switch. Both of these possible issues can be fixed with a bit of simple tinkering, if you don't mind voiding your warranty.I bought this unit with the above knowledge and am still quite satisfied with my purchase. As said, this is an excellent unit for the price.

This unit isn't very good but it's cheap and I use it a lot.The tip gets wildly different temperature readings while on and even clogs while it is on at both ends of the soldering tip or even in the middle! Right now my nozzle is clogged right at the filter pipe cap! It's only 186F at the part that goes into the filter pipe cap and the unit is set to 280c at the moment. Not hot enough to melt the solder that is clogging the very back of it. The drill bit they send for cleaning/unclogging is your best friend but I think it needs to be thicker I am trying to find a new one now. What I do when the unit clogs while I am using it is eject the tube crank it up the 450 touch my solder iron to back end of the desoldering tip and use the drill bit that comes with it. If I am lucky this works. If not I take it all apart and find the position the desoldering tip is clogged at and use my hot air SMD rework to melt the solder in it. Most people that are buying this unit are like me have the know how to fix things and don't want to spend 300 dollars so we live with it.It's poorly designed and doesn't deserve a 5 star rating there is no way a unit should clog while on! But this one does. Use your multimeter temperature reading and you'll see why, it doesn't maintain a constant temp it fluctuates a lot!Course it's possible I have a defective unit would love to see if others see the wild temperature fluctuations in their units.