I'll likely be emailing you for a cap kit soon
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When soldering SMD caps to a board, do you use an iron, or is there some magic with a heat gun I'm not aware of?
Sorry for the delay responding. I was busy at the moment I read it and decided to come back later, then couldn't remember where I read it. Hunted through email, thought I saw it there.
For cap removal, I like to use a pair of soldering pencils. Previously I had wrote 15 watt, but those are really only good for tiny SM resistors not connected to a ground plane. For removing the bypass capacitors something more like a pair of 30 - 45 watt pencils works much better -- and lots of liquid solder flux. Make is much easier to get the old solder to melt and flow and also eases cleanup of the old solder with braid. Leaves a sticky mess, but you're gonna be washing the board any way.
For soldering in positioon, 15 watts works fne, generally. I get the pads clean and flat with no mounds of solder remaining, then tin just one pad. Then position an cap on that set of pads. Hold it down with some kind of implement; I use a flat head screwdriver. And melt the solder on the one tinned pad until that end sinks down to the pad.l Be sure to heat the capacitor terminal as well as the pad so that you get a good solder joint. Then solder the other pad normally. If you tin both pads you can never get the cap to settle flat. Tinning no pads means you need three hands. One to hold down the cap, one to hold the pencil and one to hold the solder.
Hot air for removal and hot air with solder paste for soldering will work too. There are many ways of successfully accomplishing this. In all cases, it's good to have some practice to learn the ways of your chosen method.
