The transaction started badly when the seller lied about shipping. 8 days after placing my order, I got notification from Tindie that it had been shipped. The truth was that it didn't ship until 22 days after I placed the order. Normally the Tindie buyer protection rules would generate an automatic refund if it isn't shipped within 14 days, but because the seller had marked it as shipped, this didn't happen.

Shipping itself took an extra 17 days, and incurred customs fees and admin costs at this end (Not the sellers fault).

On first use, the unit made creaking noises and burning smells, although I guess this is to be expected. The Android app used to control it is not intuitive to use at all, and is poorly documented. Some features (such as joining the device to my home wifi network) simply don't work. It is only an alpha release though, so I guess this is to be expected - however, this alpha release hasn't been touched in 18 months, so it feels like it got to the point of kind of working then just abandoned. Despite this, tests with the ReflowR went well, and a few days later I used it for a run of PCBs.

Compared to a hot air reflow station, the ReflowR worked really well and produced very consistent results. My workflow had to change so that I was pasting up the next board while the previous one was being heated - as opposed to doing all the pasting then all the placing then all the heating. But that was fine, and I was pleased with the unit.

However, the next time I used it, it simply did not work. After running some tests, it became apparent that the element had failed. I contacted the seller, and a week later he replied to say that he would send a new element in the next 2 or 3 days. It is now two weeks later and despite sending more messages to the seller, nothing has been sent and I'm not getting any replies.

Overall, this has been a very very expensive way to run off one set of PCBs that has only left me with an ugly expensive paper weight and a lot of wasted time.

I purchased a ReFlowR back in August, but I did not get around to using it until now.

I mostly live in the Apple/iOS technosphere, so I would appreciate an iOS app to control/monitor the ReFlowR, but since you can use it without the app this isn’t a deal breaker. I also have an Android tablet so I can use the companion app when I want to — a must to be able to take advantage of the external temperature probe add-on.

The documentation available from the website is complete and easy to understand.

I very much appreciated the inclusion of various components and a couple of random PCBs to practice on. I soldered a couple of the resistors to one of the practice PCBs to get my feet wet before moving on to my own project.

I have a set of three PCBs I designed in Eagle and had produced by OSH Park. It was tricky to get the solder paste applied to all the pads, but placing my components with the tweezers and then using the “reflow low” process (4 presses of the button) to “bake” everything into place was very simple.

My next step will be figuring out how to make my own solder stencil using some thin sheet metal and my CNC router.

I purchase the large Reflowr on 22 Jan and I received a shipping notification a few days later. Great!
After not receiving it and the tracking number provided not really working I messaged the seller about 2 weeks later. No response...
A week later I sent another message and I finally got a response, apparently it was never even shipped! I sent another message a few days later to confirm it has been shipped and if there was a new tracking number but never got a response from that!

Anyway package has finally arrived after over a month so very poor shipping and communication.

On arrival, the box was pretty beat up but no real damage to the unit. The instructions asked me to remove some small yellow plastic pieces before use, however they had all broken and fallen inside the unit, so I had to pull it apart to get them out.

Finally I was ready to make up the board which went quite well so no real issues there!
I couldnt get the device to connect to my own wifi although it said it was successful in the app, but it never got an IP address or appeared in my router. So I just had to connect directly to its own wifi. Still havnt worked that out.

In short, product and document is good, the rest of the experience was below average.

Didn't use toxic heat resistant materials, like the cheap oven ones (no leathal asbestos) which has no alternative at this price! can be used by simply pressing the button, considering i'm a stickler when it comes to minimalising the use of mobile phones...
i found it to encourage 'a dab hand' approach, first uses being carefully done, to then a real rewarding sence of confidence in being able to slightly mess about with the thing (as solid rewards.) Deserves a better postal sytem, but who doesn't? remember to be nice to the posty....thats what makes the posty nice to you! EVERYONE THAT GETS ONE OF THESE THAT WORKS, IS A WINNER!

I've been using this little beast for a few months now and frankly I'm impressed. I've reflowed dozens of boards and I'm not even tempted to use my reflow oven for single sided boards. Sure the android app is a little wonky, and the sheet metal enclosure isn't Apple perfect, but for 129 bucks plus shipping the ReflowR is an amazing deal. Stop dithering and just order one.

I bought the larger ReflowR in June and it was apparently lost in shipping. Not deterred, I ordered a second one and am really pleased with the purchase.
If you've used one of the small IR ovens you know the problems with hot/cold spots in the oven and the terrible smell most of them have. The ReflowR is exactly the right fix for this. I'm using it for light production work and am very pleased with it. Even at twice the price.

Lafras communicated about the product very well and promptly. The price is definitely right for what the product does. Finish quality is about as expected for something that is hand tooled and made in smaller runs. My reflowr was missing a couple rivets but it may have been from shipping vibrations (also Customs opened/inspected the package, so they may have taken the rivets out in an attempt to see what was inside the precarious metal box with wires!). My only suggestion to Lafras would be better packing for shipment - bigger box with foam for absorbing impacts - the box was only couple inches bigger than item in all directions which is risky for intercontinental shipments. It is nice Lafras includes some PCB boards and components so you can immediately play around with the Reflowr without using your own prototype boards as guinea pigs.

This tool allowed me to move beyond through-hole components in my projects. It is very simple to use and clearly documented. Works well both standalone and with an android app. Nice addition was a mini-tutorial with sample PCB boards and components to try things out. Shipping time was as advertised, not too long. Packing was a bit tight, but the unit arrived in a good condition.

Ordered on June 28, 2017.

Shipped according Lafras Jul 03, 2017 via South African Post Office from Durban (tracking never worked for me).

Notified on August 5, 2017 from Lafras: "I expect all European shipments including July to arrive 6 to 8 weeks from now".

After delivery urging Lafras on September 19, 2017: "Your tracking info says on route. After 3 October it will be 90 days then I can escalate with the post office and get a more complete answer."

After another delivery urging Lafras on October 15, 2017: "You are in the group of 7 European parcels that have not yet been delivered, they all had movement mid August, and 2 of them (France and Netherlands) scanned in the destination countries this last week. I am optimistic the rest will be scanned in the destination countries soon and delivered before month end."

December 20th, 2017: "Your ReflowR has been sent by airmail, It is expected to take 2 to 4 weeks to reach you."

December 23rd, 2017: https://captain-slow.dk/2017/12/23/abusing-crowdfunding-featuring-lafras-henning/

BTW: I am not able to rate product (because I do not have it) but I am not allowed to post review without product rating, so just ignore my product ratings please.

This is my first time at reflow having stuck to the traditional soldering iron and I have had great success. The unit is uncomplicated and performs as it should. I used the inbuilt profiles and successfully reflowed some xson (3mm x 5mm) chips and other just as small items. The owner responded to all my questions on reflow in general and just not about the reflowr which was greatly appreciated.

As an aside I received the reflowr in half the shipping time that was quoted.

Having used this for a couple of weeks I have really grown to appreciate it, the review by "Manuel" is pretty balanced and summarises the product well, except I would say I have grown to like the simple lines of the construction.

Does it reflow boards - Yes it does and with the Android app it is easy to pick profiles or build a custom one.

When my unit arrived it was actually configured for 110 Volts when I needed 240, I took a peek inside and could see it was probably just a case of reconfiguring the heater winding via the connector and no big deal (i.e. The unit was designed to ship as either 110 or 230/240 volts). I sent Lafras an email and he replied within few hours confirming this and with a diagram showing how to move the heater connector - Great service.

Looking inside the construction seems very sound and to be frank both the operating temperature and the volts bite, so I am happy that someone else has made a working unit. The cool down is a bit slow but nothing to worry about.

I was worried about delivery, having read some of the other reviews so I paid for the EMS tracking, I was able to track the parcel all the way to our office and it only took about seven working days. This website http://www.track-trace.com/post is better than the standard EMS site as it follows the parcel when it is handed over to other carriers

All in all I am very pleased with the unit.

TLDR; Easy to use, not very nice, works well.
After using it for some weeks, here are the
Pros:
+ Easy usage (Push N times the red button to select th Nth profile, and let the magic happen)
+ Works without android phone (Out of the box, I could start using it)
+ Without external thermocouple QFN with thermal pad parts as well as fine pitch connectors (<0.5mm) where reflowed successfully.
+ Tested with: SOT23, 0603, QFN, various connectors, TSSOP
+ Easy to mount and dismount, also very compact form factor.
+ Shipping using EMS express was ok (1 Week including customs to Europe)
+ No burnt solder masks, my PCB still had the beautiful classic mat green solder mask we all love.
+ The seller responded very fast on my questions.
Cons:
- Metal case feels unfinished and rough, but is solid. 3D printed cover of wireless module breaks easily (my bad, but does not affect results)
- Loud buzzer (I have been told that you can disable it using the app, but I haven't used the app)
- Cools down slowly, it might require you to remove the PCB from the hot plate depending on the required reflow profile.
- No desktop client/app/script. Only android right now. I was not able to find any protocol specifications to quickly write a PC client.

General usage remarks:
- Sometimes ordering a stencil with your boards let's you reach the "free shipping" threshold, and therefore you get a stencil at quite the same price than without.
- LED's require a more precise placement. They tend to not put themselves straight during reflow like other passives. Resistors can be placed miserably and still will put themselves right during reflow.
- When putting solder paste with a stencil for very small parts, try to use one (not the old one you had laying around since the beginning of recorded history).
- When reflowing multiple times (should be avoided) the PCB may starts to warp. But it didn't affect too much the process in my case. This might be an issue depending on your layout. Try to put all components at once.
- Put a "Hot surface" sticker on the box, it really not a toy.

I am satisfied with the results. The product not the nicest one, but it don't mind. It does the job quite well even without external thermocouple in my case. I would have appreciated a PC client or any open documentation about the protocol.
I feel like this tool is a good value if you have small parts or high density prototypes and dont want to spend two more weeks waiting for a company to populate your board. I feel like the price is appropriate for this tool.

Review:
I was looking for a small reflow oven/hot plate. I am making microcontroller based circuits
and planning to do very low volume production for some of them.
I couldn't find a suitable reflow oven/hot plate, they were simply too big. Then I saw this one on Tindie.
There were no reviews, so I was hesitant a bit. But the idea was great, just what I was looking for.
The indigogo campaign apparently did well.
Here is my experience:
- It arrived in 7 days from South Africa to San Franciso/USA for $44 express shipping.
- The reflow unit worked well as a standalone unit. The Android alpha application did not start
the reflow at first. Few days later, it was upgraded and asked me to upgrade the firmware.
It then worked fine. I initially had problems joining wifi. It turned out a network issue. It is happy with 801n only
network at 2.2Ghz, but not 801ac 5Ghz.
- The youtube video and doc was easy to follow. I was able to build the sample circuit and it worked.
But the doc is only a paper copy. I couldn't locate it on the web page.
So, if you use IOS and keep your paper copy around.
- The paper doc reads 10uF but the provided capacitors measured 3.7uF. I've used 10uF from my stock.
- The cooling is little slower than the profile, as expressed by the maker, but it should be fine.
- The webpage can use a facelift, there are easy to use tools/services like wordpress, weebly, wix etc.

Ordered May 24th 2017. Shipped June 2nd. But then it took 1 month to get from Hillcrest to "DURMAIL INTERNATIONAL", which I assume is still in the vicinity of Durban. I have been waiting for 53 days since shipping now. Everyone should discuss with this seller about the shipping options. I have shipped many items from Asia with 45+ day shipping services and they never take this long. 1 month prior to leaving the country of origin is a joke.

Info@powerstream.com.au
So far we are eagerly awaiting its arrival and I cannot get to 100 Characters with nothing to talk about.
Ian