Homemade Nearly-free Soldering Iron Stand

Why pay megabucks for a fancy Soldering Iron stand when you can build one yourself with scrap?

Or, why use that flimsy plastic stand that comes with your cheap pencil soldering iron, and risk burns, fire, or melted stuff?

Step 1: Parts

- piece of wood, appropriately sized for stability and weight
- heavy coat hangar wire
- broom handle (only needed temporarily.. borrow your mom's/wife's/roommate's broom for 5 minutes) or 3/4 - 1" dowel scrap
- half of a travel soap dish
- kitchen sponge

optional
- rubber feet, or just staple a piece of old bicycle inner tube to the bottom of the wood to make it non-slip

Step 2: Coil Iron Holder

Here's my trick for making a tidy coil out of stiff coat-hangar wire:

- drill a hole of the same side into the broomhandle.
- insert the wire
- slowly, neatly wrap the wire into a coil a dozen times.

(here's the trick)
- since it is now 'locked' onto the broomhandle, get your metal-blade hacksaw and cut the wire exactly where it enters the hole. Now freed, remove the coil, throw out the leftover bit of wire, and return the broomhandle to mom's closet (shhh.)

Step 3: Remaining Assembly Steps

- bend the wire into two legs (a u-shaped arrangement, look at the pic)
- drill two holes in your baseboard to accomodate the U. The first hole is more oval-shaped, to accomodate the two diameters of wire that have to fit in there.
- nail or staple the plastic soap dish tray
- cut the sponge to nicely fit into the soap dish

note: the Coil can conveniently be removed from the holes in the base, for compact storage. Or, if collapsibility is not important, mount the wire to the board using screws, using a drilled-through hole, or any number of methods of your own invention.

FYI, when soldering, a key trick is to keep the tip nice and clean ("silvered" or "tinned"). This is the purpose of the sponge. Make sure it is wet when you're using it.