JBC vs FixPoint solder station

I've used JBC's soldering/rework station for some 10 years now, and despite price (IIRC close to 2400€ for solder/desolder station I have) it has been a very good investment. Nice to work with, easily changed tips for different needs and so on. It is not easily movable, though, since it has separate control units and holders, so recently I went and bought cheap-ish soldering station for "field" use for whopping 95€, VAT included.

There are cheaper irons available too, but like I've said so many times - never take the cheapest one, go one price group up and choose from there. Cheapest ones are always pure crap.

First impression is not great, but not horrible either. It's plastic-y, but feels solid enough so there should not be need for padded bag for it. Although I wouldn't throw it in my toolbag like a wrench either.

Name on label is fixPOINT EP-5, although I am almost certain that this very same station is sold under several names elsewhere. Display isn't as bad it seems on picture, but not great either. Since by JBC was set to 350C, it set this to same temperature too.

I turned both stations on at same time, and after just several seconds JBC was already up to correct temperature. Fixpoint however took easily minute or two to get to requested temperature - or, at least reported temperature.

For reference, here is JBC holder (control unit itself not shown). Width is about third of Fixpoint, but iron tips makes it much higher. Tip can be changed by pulling old out (see empty slot on bottom left) and pushing new tip in, without using other hand to hold tip at any point. Great when you suddenly find yourself needing other tip for larger or finer work.

In my work, I find that it is best if you can hold the iron as close as possible of the tip, and JBC (on top, obviously) is absolute winner here. The green holder is thin (just 12mm in total width), so it can be held like pen and distance between tip and holder is less than 60mm, allowing you to have very nice, fine control there. And although holder is very thin, I find that only after very long period of working (4+ hours of continuous building a prototype/test board) it gets a bit warm - but even then, not excessively so. For shorter rework times you don't even notice the heat.

fixPoint on the other hand... Well, let's just to say that I don't even bother trying to do anything fine with this. It is long and clumsy. Definitely not recommended for fine reworking. But that's okay for me, this time; I bought this for crude-ish field use exclusively. That's why there's solder wire wrapped around the handle; it's best place to hold it when hauling this around.

I wouldn't want to change fixPoint tip when working either, as it requires unscrewing the metal part completely and changing tip part. And since cooling/heating it takes a long time, you'll be waiting for long time to be able to do it.

I don't have suitable thermometer for measuring actual heat of tips, so Flir thermal camera will have to do as substitute. Emissivity is very likely far off (metal parts are shiny/reflective so camera can't measure them properly). Note also "multispectral" ghost images below; when taking images from very close range, images don't overlay properly.
As reported, Flir apparently can't reach these temperatures (showing just ">280" for JBC), but assuming that JBC is approximately correct, the fixpoint is... not even close. Both irons were set to 350, both showed 350, but fixPoint here seems to be significantly cooler. Hot enough for leaded soldering, but I think I wouldn't want to try lead-free with it.

But again, FLIR isn't greatest tool when trying to measure temperatures of relatively shiny metal objects.

So, I wouldn't recommend fixPoint for general work, but if you need iron only occasionally and just for small fixes with larger-scale work (no tiny SMDs), it might be okay. You get what you pay for.

USB type C

When I was designing newest board layout, around two years ago, I briefly thought about using USB C-type connector in it. Device itself doesn't use any new USB-C related features, but new connector at least would get rid of "which way up" problem of microB.

After some reading and pondering, I found few schematics showing how to wire USB C to backwards compatibility mode, but even these were somewhat complex and with some gotchas that might have needed changed if I were to run onto them. So I abandoned the idea and used plain old micro B connector instead.

Just now we're hearing that Raspberry Pi 4 boards have problems due to new C-type connector, as they have wired CC pins incorrectly which makes board to not work with some (more expensive) cables due to power negotiating failure.

Eben Upton, co-founder of Raspberry, says; "A smart charger with an e-marked cable will incorrectly identify the Raspberry Pi 4 as an audio adapter accessory and refuse to provide power."

That made me smile - just a bit. Note subtle blame-shifting there? No, it's not charger does identifies Pi4 incorrectly; it's Pi4 that identifies itself as audio accessory by shorting those two pins, and charger quite correctly reacts to this by not providing power to it.

Either way, I think I'll stay away from type C for a bit longer, even if the connector itself is quite nice. There's just a few too many traps there yet.

Meat substitutes

Note; this post was written almost immediately after mentioned IPO and has been sitting in my queue for a while now; I haven't tracked how the stock has performed since.

'Beyond Burger' went public some time ago. If I could easily invest in it, I might actually have throw few grand that way during IPO. Unfortunately I'm a bit (read: very) lazy and couldn't be bothered in finding out how to invest directly across the pond, so I guess I will go for other investment options nearer to me.

There is also another reason why I might just skip this company.

If you haven't heard of this company I don't blame you. They are primarily developing a fully plant-based hamburger "meat", which, if it were to replace real beef, would reduce carbon dioxide output a lot. As far as I know (again: lazy, this time in research front) they are aiming for full replacement. Look, taste, texture and so on. And then other similar replacements too, I think.

At this point I have to stop to ponder this goal. Why go that way?

In western world we have really one-sided view on diets, and these days meat in some form is included in almost every meal. If you look for even vegetarian (not even mentioning vegan) option, you very likely will get something bland, tasteless and possibly even gross to eat. There are exceptions, and situation definitely is getting better, but for the most part this still is too true. If (when) this is your experience on vegetarian options, beef replacement sounds pretty damn good.

On the other hand, people in India on the other hand make absolutely wonderful vegetarian and fully vegan foods. Unfortunately my skill isn't there to replicate them well enough so that is a bit difficult route. If you have tried (and liked, like I do) these, there might not be need for beef replacement.

Back to burgers. I might be an exception, but I don't particularly even like usual beef burgers. To me they're ... bland. Common burger is almost tasteless, to the point that you need to drench them in condiments before it can be eaten (before you protest, have you eaten and liked a burger without ketchup/mustard/mayo?)

Again, I might be exception, but most of the time however I don't really even want a "meat substitute" anyway - especially for a burger - but to replace that protein with something else. Often this implies beans, peas and/or lentils.

Some time ago I found a chickpea-feta recipe that is great replacement for burger patties. It does not taste the same as beef but like I said, I've never been really a fan of beef burger anyway. So this recipe was great, and better yet, tastes good even as-is - although I replaced feta with different type of cheese as others in family are not exactly fond of (strong taste of) feta.

In general I've followed this same path when reducing meat usage. Most of the time simply replacing meat with something and expecting it to taste same is nothing but route to major disappointment. It's almost always better to alter recipe more to suit taste of chosen meat replacement than to expect it to be good with just the replacement. I realize that this is not easy and requires some experimentation and ability to figure out spices or other changes you need to make recipe work. Then again, good things rarely are easy, and cooking isn't an innate gift - it's something everyone can learn. I've practiced for two decades now and still rate myself a passable cook at best.

And this is the reason why I am a bit skeptical with meat replacements. They won't taste the same anyway, so why really bother, when it's usually easier - and cheaper - to adapt the dish itself to suit new ingredients. Last I heard, mentioned beyond burgers aren't exactly cheap.

All that being said, there is one dish I still make with meat as I haven't found even closely suitable replacement for meat in it: chili. But since I make it about once a month or so, for now I allow myself to indulge in it. It's still better to make good effort on the other days and allow that once in a while than to fail there and fall directly back to old habits.

USB scanner

Ages ago I got a Canon FB630U USB scanner. I'm not exactly sure when, exactly, this was, but I'd guess this was around turn of the millennium. It's hasn't been up to current standards for a long time now, but it is still functional. At least I think it is, haven't used it over 10 years now, and it has been just sitting in storage.

So, what's inside?

For once, it's (kinda) easy to see; it's all visible by simply opening the lid!

At right is the control board (okay, hidden underneath that metal), on left scanner head and guide/drive system and... Well, there's nothing else, really.

Scanner head moves across the scan area, guided by metal bar (on left) and moved with chain pulley system driven by a small stepper motor. Here drive mechanism is upside down, usually it's hidden underneath scanner head assembly. Motor was already taken out in this picture as it could prove useful yet.

I am no mechanical designer but the drive system seems pretty robust, with minimal change of slippage or other such failures.

The scan head itself is single row, with light bar and dot scanner built in single, tightly integrated unit.On left here is light source (two leds, it seems; on mechanics assembly there is light bar to distribute light evenly), and on bottom first few scanner units can barely be seen. On top of that was focusing array, essentially large number of short (approx 5mm) light tubes, there to improve pixel resolution.

I don't have equipment for taking pictures with large magnification so this, unfortunately, will have to do.  I am not familiar on how exactly this works, but it would appear to be some kind of serially-driven array, as there is only 7 signals (light not included) going to main PCB. Based on PCB it is some kind of three-color CCD row array.

From date codes on PCB I'd expect this to be designed in 1999, and very likely I got this early 2000 or 2001.

Botton left is USB connector, then power filtering and regulation (done with classic 34063 buck converter). Components that are underneath scanning head need to be very low, so capacitor have been angled to 90 degrees, placed in slots on board.

GLUSB97SC08 appears to be USB to IEEE 1284 (parallel printer) converter. If I remember correctly, this scanner was also available as parallel printer port version, so they took that designed and shoved USB converter in there. This was around the time when Windows 2000 and then XP took away applications' ability to access printer port directly so USB was a bit of forced update there.

On top is IS51C1024, SRAM memory chip, and below it LM9830VJD, a built-for-purpose flatbed scanner controller with illumination, motor control and CCD reading all included in single package. I almost feel betrayed here as I was expecting more discrete approach, but guess even then these were already built to bring the price down.

All in all, this is neatly done design, but in case of Canon, I wouldn't expect anything else.