SMD Reflow Oven Controller Upgrade - Fundraiser

Space and infrastructure
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Hi All:

VHS is looking to upgrade the controller on our existing reflow oven.

The Ask
We are looking for donations to cover the cost of the new controller.

Cost is ~$175 Cad with shipping.

All contributions no matter how small are appreciated.

Some History
In 2016 VHS raised funds for a reflow oven kit that was assembled by member @packetbob. He has volunteered to do the upgrade if we fund this.

The VHS reflow oven has seen lots of use in many SMD soldering workshops, group builds and by individual members assembling their own boards.

Why Upgrade?
Increased ease of use with colour touchscreen, improved hardware, and ability to have multiple heat profiles which will allow having lead-free solder and lead solder as two different profiles.

Whizoo has come out with version 3 of their controller which has many additions to our existing controller.

c3_oven
c3_oven780×585 78.6 KB

A quick summary of the improvements over Controlleo2

Giant leap forward to Controleo3

Controleo3 was designed to address ControLeo2’s shortcomings, and extend the controller’s capabilities far into the future. It retains ControLeo2’s strengths like ease-of-use, flexibility and openness but dramatically increases performance and useability.

  • 4" 480 x 320 color touchscreen
  • Processor is 12 times faster
  • 10 times more memory and 40 times the storage
  • Supports 6 outputs (up from 4)
  • Support for up to 28 profiles
  • PID support, with intelligent tuning
  • SD card support for log files (coming soon), screenshots and reflow profiles
  • Upgraded thermocouple IC has line-voltage filtering
  • Hardware is more robust (dare we say idiot-proof?)
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I’ll chip in $20.

3

Sure, $20

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Woo! Thank you for doing this. Happy to throw in 20bux. Also thanks to the amazing @packetbob for building the original and helping us with this upgrade.

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5

I’ll drop $30, I suspect I’ll be getting some good use from this in the future :slight_smile:

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6

i got 20 for you

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$110! Wooo. We are so close to the amount needed. Just bumping this in case anyone else wants to help us upgrade the SMD oven.

@Majicj how can I send you cash?

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In for $30.

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Thanks so much @mirong

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is this still a thing if Brian is donating one?

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Worth discussing in #electrical on slack. There are some downfalls to the IR one that Brian is donating (thanks Brian - for donating!)…but we can defo make use of it and it could be improved with some hacking. Overall I think we still want to upgrade the in-house one and also hack Brian’s (which he is okay with). We could definitely make use of 2 ovens. Just my 2 cents.

Edit: @Majicj also has some info on the capabilities of the donated one and why we should still upgrade the existing oven.

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ok. my 20 still stands… just curious

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My cash still stands, tentatively, but it could be good hold off a bit, to explore the new oven. See if it is Good Enough™

I definitely had issues with the existing VHS oven. It was neat, but it never blew me away.

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For sure - I think we’ll find we still want to upgrade the current one even just to have 2 ovens capable of doing unleaded at the same time. Would be great for SMD workshops.

Here’s what one person did to improve the IR one.

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So what, we are $35 shy? I’ll take up the spread :slight_smile:

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I’m in for $20.

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who should we give the money to?

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Thank you everyone for your donations.

The controller has been ordered and is on it’s way.

Just to be clear. There has been a donation of a reflow oven by @brianzhouzc for which we are thankful for. Having a second oven will be great for workshops as there is the cool down time between baking boards that slows things down.

If anyone prefers not to donate then no worries. Just let me know and I will adjust the figures below.

$20 - @Majicj - paid
$20 - @Jarrett - paid
$20 - @Janet - paid
$30 - @Cash_Garman - paid
$20 - @winegummo. - paid
$30 - @mirong - paid
$35 - @chadleaman - paid
$175 - Total

$20 - @Pat (possible replacement for above)

I will send a pm to everyone with details on how to send an etransfer.

Mark

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Woo hoo! Thanks for organizing this. Cash sent to you.

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I have taken the VHS SMD Reflow Oven to my place to retrofit the new controller that @Majicj got with the donations…
I have left my own oven at the Space in the event someone needs to reflow solder while I`m working on the upgrade…
Its the same as the VHS model…
I do have the temperature cranked up a bit higher than normal for leaded solder as it seemed to work better for some larger boards I was doing…

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