I'm going to be soldering something pretty soon, but I think I may have ordered the wrong solder for electronics. The kind I picked up was this: http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2062725&cp I was told to pick up some Rosen Core, but this stuff has Rosen Core listed in the ingredients. If anyone can confirm that I'm ok with this, I'd appreciate it.
That definitely is the right gauge solder for electronics. What are you going to solder? If you need to do some fine work, the rosin core alone probably won't be enough, you'll need liquid rosin flux too.
I've used silver bearing solder and it does alright. I just wouldn't recommend 96/4 silver bearing solder. It has a higher melting point and doesn't seem to stick as well. What you have is close to the preferred 60 / 40 (your difference is made up in the addition of 2% silver), so it should be fine.
Yeah it'll work, but as stated it has a higher melting temp and has the tendency to do something called 'balling' where you end up with a blob of solder on the end of your soldering iron - if you have a moist sponge beside you whilst you solder and use it to wipe off the excess solder then it should be fine. Try it out on something like a dead board you have kicking around. I have an old PS2 PSU (110vac) which is useless to me which I use whenever I change solder or buy a new iron. To get used to it I try it out. Good luck!
I'll be using it on my Wii console so it shouldn't be so difficult (only 4 wires). The rest of my stuff should work fine. I did my Gamecube a while back and had little to no trouble, despite being un-prepared. I picked up the following: http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2104639&cp=&sr=1&origkw=magnifying&kw=magnifying&parentPage=search http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2062728&cp=&sr=1&origkw=15+watt+solder&kw=15+watt+solder&parentPage=search and some desoldering braid, which was very much needed on my Gamecube job. Can anyone recommend any wires to use? And perhaps somewhere I can find them locally (will any hardware store do? What kind would I be looking for?) Also, I've been reading that its best to heat the area you are applying the solder to, then apply the solder directly to the join (which would be heated up). Is this recommended for electronic work like you'd find in the Wii? Or might it cause issues?
Do not heat with the iron, usually when they mean heat, they mean a board heater. Applying even a 15W too long can damage the IC. If the joint is lubed up adequately and your iron is fully heated, you can make a nice connection in less than 2 seconds.
So I should tin the wire, and put a little bit on the board as well? Then what? Heat the wire up and place it on the board?
You should first put a little flux on the wire and pad/pin, then lightly tin both (except if you're soldering to a tiny pin, don't tin it!), then apply the iron to them both. If you don't have quite enough solder, you can feed the spool's thread into the joint while applying the iron. It's easier to add more solder than to clean it up! You don't need to heat the wire, that'll just make it harder to handle. Flux is there to make the solder stick, but don't apply too much to a PCB because it's incredibly hard to clean up.
