EEVblog #1305 – HEPA Solder Fume Extractor
EEVblog #1305 – HEPA Solder Fume Extractor
Review of the $225 Kingsom KS-180 HEPA flexible arm solder fume extractor.
Does it suck?
http://www.kingsomtech.com/product/Fume-Extractor/
https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Kingsom-Nail-Suction-Dust-Collector_62409199915.html
This one has a lower noise spec and has free DHL shipping: https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_BffhOC9x
If you want just the flexible tubing for a DIY solution:
https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_d8U2dMl
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The AliExpress look different, different model.. Is it the same thing even as they look different and have different model numbers?
I watch a lot of your videos and trust your advice. Say "dodgy" again.
Never used an extractor, been soldering since I was about 13, now nearly 50 no sign of any ill effects. Also given most of my stuff is done in the field most extractors are impractical.
I’ve been running one of the same model unit (but branded under the Fumego name as XF180 – link at the end) – works great for me. I have it mounted under my bench with a drilled hole to snake the extractor through to make everything as hidden and compact as possible.
One downside for the unit for me is that the unit powers up to off and pressing the speed control button was a huge pain in the ass because I have it hidden well under my bench. I have a smart-home plug controlling the connection to my soldering station power strip and so everything else instantly powers up with one button (and auto-powers off under certain conditions for safety etc) BUT this extractor would always require me to crawl under my bench to turn it on.
To resolve this, I first hooked up a Xiaomi smart plug module directly to the button input on the control board which worked alright but having it inside the device meant that the case attenuates wifi significantly and the line is at potentially dangerous voltage so wiring it outside wasn’t going to work. This meant the functionality was intermittent and had now feedback on the current state which was pretty much unusable. So might next attempt was to wire a mains rated foot switch across the switch terminals – unfortunately in the process, I didn’t sufficiently isolate between the connector I mounted to the chassis and the chassis. The switch line is obviously at ~mains voltage and I blew out presumably a bunch of components and tripped my breaker.
Finally I got back in contact with the supplier to purchase a replacement board and noticed that they now offer modifications to certain models to add the footswitch but apparently not on my model (or maybe possible by shipping the unit back – wasn’t 100% clear). But I did inquire about making a FW mod to the device so that it starts up on max speed – they slightly misunderstood me but still got mostly the outcome I wanted by bodge-wiring past the button controller and just having the unit always run at full-speed when it has power connected. This means I can now run the extractor through it’s own smart plug and control it reliably (but without ever being able to change speed anymore). If anyone is interested in performing that rework themselves – hit me up and I’ll open the device back up and document it.
Link (Taobao/Tmall) – price: ~$196USD https://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?id=575048462984
Did you pay the 333$ shipping cost (alibaba)?
I still feel like the best way to do it would be to have an exhaust system all the way out the roof, that is if you can design a place with that in mind or through a cut in the window like an AC system would, i guess it depends on the amount of smoke but i always feel like no matter how good a HEPA system is eventually it will clog up and require more constant replacement of filters and for the smokers out there it’s obviously convenient to have that vented fume extraction, however for when that’s not an option the HEPA solution seems pretty reasonable.
or just use a silent hoover
I like the fan assembly made of fully metal and works on the centrifuge principal like vacuum cleaners and kitchen fume extractors do…
All well and good, but what about replacement filters?
I was on their website and alibaba and was unable to locate them.
My Australian brethren you could stuff rockwool in the bottom cubby and cut the noise down.
Tired of using a small fan to blow fumes away, I made a really good extractor for a lot less than those advertised on ebay or elsewhere, here is my lil vid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ssqN37XSLw&t=572s
I only give negative feedback…Though the video was very well made.
14:07 – I once had to hand flyers into a nail salon. The smell of VOCs when I walked in…I nearly passed out! All they were using was face masks, I can’t imagine working there for hours a day.
"Tighter than a nun’s nasty" Joke of the Year nomination
I have a weller FT system at work, but the filter in this looks really nice. 🙂
Lead solder makes a lot less particles in the fumes.
That’s IP theft from manufacturers in China. Once PACE taught them the design and how to make it, they just sell it off-brand for 1/4 of the price trashing the profit margins. Rigol did that to HP as well. Think of it as buying pirated software.
C’mon Dave! Shipping costs are very high! more than the extrator’s itself! e.g. US$311 to Europe!!! How much did you really pay for yours?
You need to like, clean your table, cause it’s very messy
We need just the hood and the tubing .. where can we get just that part
If you get a moment can you check the decible volume at each level of ran usage? I’m curious. I want to buy it, but i hope the lowest setting can be around 40 decibles or lower.
What kind of fan motor is it and how is fan speed controlled? Triac and a asynchronous ac motor?
How much is there at the bottom? Would it be possible to fit a foot pedal?
Would this work in chemical laboratories setting?
My own pinned comment seem to be mysteriously vanishing from this video, I suspect because it’s got a links to ali-you know what. If you want the links, see the description above.
Very strange they don’t think to put any link or even product code for replacement filters. Seems like a nice unit, but with no clear way of replacing the filters it’s practically useless.
Why not just a normal vacuum cleaner with HEPA filter, second hand 20-30$. You have power adjusting lever built in and even the tube, wheels, just create the inlet nozzle and there you go ! And heck you can even clean your table after your job is done 🙂
14:59 out of all the ways you could have said that, I think you explained it the best
Squircle is the word you’re looking for.
I prefer to vent outside if possible. A lot of the noise will be probably due to the air flowing through the tube, can cut it down by insulating the tube and fan box.
On Amazon do they look to cost between $500-$1500, so don’t look there:-)
You can also use it to talk to the engine room on the HMAS EEVLab
I’ve got a whole home hepa system, same basic construction, uses 3 square filters, and a big fan to pull the air through them. Takes air from the cold air return, and returns it actually upstream from the intake. Probably not terribly efficient, but it works. We had a house fire, and did not know until the next morning but the hepa system filtered all the smoke out, such that none of the smoke alarms went off. One room was destroyed before it burnt itself out.
I don’t know if you still have issues with focus point, but if you set your camera to spot focus, you can set the spot of focus in the middle or 1/3rd to the left or right and remember that, and then aim the frame there to allways have what you want in focus =)
Does anyone know the link to get replacement filter?
Just had a peak at the Ersa Shop, they’re charging 200€ for the arm! BARGAIN!
Dave, i bought the UY-6151 model on Aliexpress. They gave me DHL shipping code but after 2 days they’ve deleted it and shipped via FedEx Courier 🙁
Hope i’ll not have issue with the shipping, FedEx tracking say that i should receive it on May 18
Hepa 14 is the way to go …
Do you think having a double extractor is noisier than the single box model-even if both are rated at the same dB.? Your opinion please
Although this may be answered already a lot: Hey Dave, how tall are you? I’m 1m86
Also captures the ghosts of fried components so they won’t haunt!
I think this really calls for a "pimp my air filter episode" where you add a power switch at the nozzle and maybe add some LEDs (with switch) at the nozzle too, given that you’ll always want a lot of light where you’re soldering and the nozzle might actually block ambiant light.
Lol Yankee Bucks 👍
I put LED lights on my fume extractor. That way I could angle it low, and still see what I’m doing.
Soldering smoke actually causes me pain due to teeth fillings. Hot water. Ice cold. Chew on ice. Doesnt matter. But the moment solder fumes hit my teeth, large pain.
Steve, a great video, thanks for that but you are not comparing same performance products.
After doing some datasheet research your unit KS-180 is actually an "economical" line ("cheap extractor" is KingSom’s own words). The exact model you bought is not the unbranded PACE product that they also make for PACE. It uses the same nozzle and tubing but nothing inside it is the same as the unbranded PACE you are comparing to. The KS-180 is a 80W model, while the pace equivalent is somewhere around 135W-150W, so you don’t have the same fan motor either. Spec air flow is 180 cubic meters /hour (max, not nominal) which is 105 CFM, The Pace model arm EVAC 150 is 254 m^3/hour = 150 CFM, so your has significantly less suction. Comparing to Hakko FA430 which is rated at 4.7 m^3/min = 282 m^3/hour = 167 CFM. Hakko wattage is 120W much less than the actual Pace but more air flow and quieter, i suspect a more efficient motor part in the HAKKO (it is brushless, longer lasting too).
So you spent 1/2 of the PACE EVAC 150 price including shipping from china ($425) for -30% less suction. If you scale the prices for the difference in suction power, you only saved $160, except you have an economical circular ring filter which does not have the surface coverage of the PACE and HAKKO rectangular box filters. Altogether you got what you paid for, no more and probably a bit less. And i found no replacement filter listing for your unit, in fact Kingsom or fumeclear have zero listing to buy replacement filters for any of their units, i don’t know why but it’s not what you’d like to see when buying one of their unit. Then there is the risk of dealing with the chinese and the language barrier, if anything goes wrong you may have to wait months with a dead unit with no leverage inside China. God forbid you have to pay for shipping it back to China from your own pocket.
Kingsom current models are now being sold by another chinese company FumeClear which is unclear (no pun intended) if they are just a marketing facade company, or are they just stealing the design from each other sourced from the same parts which is more likely. Nothing is what it seems over there. Anyhow trying to match their current models with the PACE evac-150 equivalent spec there is only a 200W chinese model that has the identical digital interface but different chassis form factor and higher air flow 194 CFM which seems to be the new generation. I found no exact unbranded form factor match for the PACE EVAC 150 as that would probably violate the blueprints IP from PACE and expose them to be sued. Instead, they’re using a mixed bunches of loose new parts put together by hack designers, not the thoughtful designs from overseas. When you add shipping cost and duty import it comes to $726 so you only save $128 . But you always get that low confidence of "what am I getting into" when buying a chinese product over the internet. Switching parts for cheaper ones is a well accepted practice in China, you never know exactly what you get, even if re-ordering the same product. We know this already and they drop the price to make up for it but everytime i dug in deeper i always found it is not better value, the quality/perf always scales down lower that the knock off price.
At the end, yes you could save $150 for similar performance but what about replacement filters ? I was surprised to find out a whole lot of what makes chinese product expensive from australia or usa is shipping. It’s very possible that the chinese, smart as they are, know exactly how much the equivalent product cost in the usa, and mark up shipping cost to net the difference. This way only chinese corporations get the cheap price which is in line with chinese politics.
And how much is enough suction,most people only look at visible smoke which are larger particles and forgetting about the VOC gases which are invisible but no less harmful (in a more insidious way), faster spreading, lower density, more dynamic and diffuse. If the unit is barely sucking the visible smoke without a lot of extra velocity to spare as seen in your video then VOC might escape.
I am in the market for buy a fume extractor , it is why i did this research, i have no link whatsoever to any of the aforementioned brands.
Bill died so young….but at least he had hair on his chest.
is it simple enough to use a variac? i use a variac on all my simple fans to turn to voltage down to about 50%
Can this extractor be used to extract the carbon smoke while doing decarbonize of 4 wheeler (car)?
Thanks for making this video! I’m glad I saw it as I was thinking the only good "prosumer" fume extractor was the JBC Tools FAE1 and that thing is like $1400 USD with NO accessories! I didn’t even know about the Pace Arm-Evac 150! It’s less than half the price! I’m planning on ordering one of those to do double duty collecting soldering fumes as well as hooking up to my 3D printing enclosure to turn on in short intervals pulling the fumes out of there.