Unsoldering SMD components

摘要

UNDOING THE GOOD WORK. Sooner or later, after carefully soldering up a surface mount PCB and admiring it for a while, there will come that heart-stopping moment when you realise that one of the components is faulty, or you've used the wrong value, or you've simply soldered it on the wrong way round. I've had them all. So, now you're faced with the prospect of getting it off again. Oops. Usually, unless you are cannibalising an old board, you want to preserve the PCB so that you can install a replacement component. It is all too easy to pull the solder track lands off with the SMD: Photo 1 shows one of my early, blundering attempts. I don't want to do that again. So, the problem is to remove the SMD without damaging the PCB, probably needing to preserve the component too.