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Hit 1000 soldered joints in a single shift last Tuesday and my hand still hurts
Was working on a batch of old power supply boards for a recycling place near Detroit. Nothing crazy, just replacing bad caps and reflowing some cracked solder on the transformer pins. But I got into a rhythm and before I knew it I had done 1000 joints by the end of the day. Counted them up cause I was curious. My wrist was killing me the next morning, had to ice it. Made me wonder how those guys in the old factories did this day in and day out for years. Any of you ever track how many joints you do in a day?
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mia7004mo ago
Hit 250 joints one day doing guitar amp repairs and thought I was tough. 1000 is a whole different league man. Your poor hand deserves a medal and some heat packs.
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finley_gonzalez494mo ago
Read somewhere that back in the 60s, some soldering operators at Western Electric would hit well over 1500 joints a shift on those old telephone switchboards. They had these special chairs and foot pedals to control the solder feed, real assembly line style. Your 1000 is impressive but those guys were doing it for decades, probably scar tissue on scar tissue by the end. Hope youve got some decent ergonomics set up or your next ice pack is gonna have your name on it.
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iris9274mo ago
Doesn't the number itself kind of miss the point though? I mean @finley_gonzalez49 brings up those old factory workers but that was repetitive simple work on a flat board with a steady hand, not hunched over some janky old power supply with burnt pads and bad angles. A thousand joints on junk boards versus a thousand on a clean assembly line are two totally different beasts.
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