I have a Weller WES51 soldering station with the PES51 pencil. It's about 10 years old however I have kept it very well. I've changed the tip a few days ago and noticed that the tip does not get hot enough to melt the solder. I've turned the temp. dial to max. and tried again and still it would not melt the solder.
After the pencil cooled down I took it apart and noticed that the heating element (or at least the part of it that comes in contact with the tip) is heavily corroded, so much that most of it is black. Is this something I can replace or does this mean the entire pencil has to go?
Update – I've spent some time online and it seems that the heating element is something that one can buy online for $40+ which makes it a bad solution as a new pencil is about $50 shipped. Another problem could be the the temp. sensing which might or might not be cheaper to fix but I don't have anyway to measure the tip temp. at this point.
Best Answer
I haven't seen a failure like this that was due to the base. I have seen failures of the pencil due to the wiring between the base and the pencil. I'd check that first. I've been a working tech since 1981, and I always. preferred Weller equipment.