Hakko 933 soldering iron temperature buttons

Hi all, newbie here...
I recently bought a Hakko 933 soldering iron on ebay as I needed to be able to solder some large power supply wires and I only had an Antex 18 watt iron. As it is 50 watts I thought it should be man enough for the job. However, it would barely melt the solder. After downloading the instruction manual I realised that the little button on the side with 390 on it, controls the temperature at 390 degrees so it wasn't hot enough for the job. The manual shows they do a whole set of buttons for different temperatures but searching on-line, I have not been able to find anyone that sells them. The 933 has now been replaced by a new model with adjustable temperature. Does anyone know where I can get these temperature buttons? Thanks in advance, Steve.

390°C should be more than hot enough. Are you sure you have the tip well tinned and are using an appropriate solder? Perhaps post a picture of the wires you are trying to solder and something for size reference.

Ylli said:

390°C should be more than hot enough. Are you sure you have the tip well tinned and are using an appropriate solder? Perhaps post a picture of the wires you are trying to solder and something for size reference.

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The 734°F (390°C) is more than enough. The problem with Hakko soldering irons is that they don't sense when heat is sucked from the tip and it needs to deliver some of the 50W of available power back to the tip until it gets back up to 390°C. Other brands are much more compliant about maintaining the temp as the tip is pressed against a cool copper wire.

Also, I am not sure a higher temp button would be available. Look at the soldering iron you bought. The barrel already has become quite hot and discoloring the chrome plated steel, any hotter and the plastic handle will melt.

This is what I am trying to solder/de-solder. First I need to de-solder the red and black wires from the power supply on the bottom left corner of the circuit board, then solder them to a connector. I couldn't seem to get enough heat into it as the solder was just re-solidifying before I could pull the wire out.
Hakko list seven temperature buttons for this iron ranging from 300 degrees to 480 degrees. The 390 is the middle one so it will withstand a substantially higher temperature.

390C is far more than hot enough, even for lead free solder.

Your tip is probably too small from the photos. You need a large tip with large thermal mass to store more thermal energy since it gets sucked into the workpiece and drops the temperature of the tip because the heating element can't pump heat in fast enough. A really hot, small tip with a lot of wattage behind it either won't heat up a large workpiece, or will damage things before the entire piece comes to temperature.

Also, use rosin flux.

I keep 60/40 Pb/Sn solder around for that exact purpose. When you melt it onto ROHS solder,
the lead lowers the melting point enough to remove the old solder.

Also, that tip doesn't look like the correct tip for that kind of de-soldering.

Do you have other tips for that iron?

If not, take a look here.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00J045ZVQ/ref=psdc_13837321_t1_B00GZGLQW4

Thanks for the replies, that's really useful. I will get a bigger tip and some rosin flux and give that a go.