Hot vs cold solder joints - which actually holds up longer on vintage game consoles?

I've been repairing old Nintendo consoles for about 6 years now and I'm still on the fence about this. Always heard cold joints are weaker but I've pulled apart some Game Boys where the cold-looking joints held up for 20+ years without cracking, while some shiny hot joints on a SNES power jack failed after 3 years. On my last Sega Genesis repair I tried doing a mix of both temps on different capacitors and the cold ones actually seemed tougher when I flexed the board. Am I missing something or are shiny joints overrated? What's your experience been with joint temp on older boards?

2 comments

2 Comments

hannah38527d ago

Wait, did @gavin80 ever try that trick where you scrape the solder mask off the ground plane first? My buddy Eric fixed his childhood Game Boy by doing that and the joints looked awful but the thing has been running for 5 years straight now.

gavin8027d ago

Bet on the board condition over the joint temp itself - old solder masks get brittle and flake off, so a cold joint on a clean pad outlives a hot one on corroded ground plane every time.