The AM Forum

These were on a garage sale table for $1 each. No need to say who owns them now. Both work. Hope they will be good for soldering things to chassis and other work too big for a pencil and too small for the 250W gun.
Not that there's any work too small for a 250W gun, properly wielded.

Red handle
ALL MFG CO
CAT NO. 186
WATTS 75
GROVE CITY PA

Black handle
Hexacon Electric Co.
soldering iron
CAT NO. 71D
80W
TYPE I

I use a 125 watt to do pl259s works grate

I have a 250 watt iron that I also picked up at a flee market for a dollar! It takes a long time to warm up but when it at operating temperature, you can solder or UN-solder really big lugs up to about 8 gauge wire or studs on a filament transformer with ease. It has a wooden handle that I think would catch fire if you left it unattended? I know you can't hold it with your bare hands after awhile! If it were used in a tin shop, they must have always used gloves to use it?

When I purchased it I did not know if it were any good but I reasoned that as large as the tip is, I could heat it up with a torch for the few times that it would be needed and its worth more now in junk value than I paid for it! There is hardly any use for such a large iron nowadays, I wonder what it could be used for in 50 years?   

They have a following with the stained glass crowd.

I've found that my American Beauty holds heat long enough for a run to my 80/40 m dipole in the winter. I heat 'er up in the garage, pull the plug and trot to the antenna.


klc

Yes stained glass!

And the 4-8 gauge solder lug crowd - indeed even the soldering of a hundred 12 or 14 gauge wires after crimping the lugs will go through a few Weller tips of the homemade #14 to #12 hairpin type. The plastic covering is removed from them first.

Another benefit of soldering a crimp-type connection for wires is that one can form the lug with pliers to accept larger or smaller wires than intended. Helps when a barrier strip won't take the size lug needed for the wire - republic credits will do fine..