(UK)Hakko fx-888d - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: alin_im
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 17, 2015, 10:01:07 pm
content: hi guys,do you know where i can buy a genuine Hakko fx-888d in UKI prefer not to tell me about ebay because i am afraid of the fake ones

author: TopLoser
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 17, 2015, 10:26:06 pm
content: Hakko website says a UK distributor ishttp://www.dancap.co.ukYou didn't really look very hard did you?

author: alin_im
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 17, 2015, 11:24:18 pm
content: Quote from: TopLoser on April 17, 2015, 10:26:06 pmi do not trust a website made in notepadi was hopping to find something more professional like sparkfun but the delivery is very expensive (half the price of the product)

author: PedroDaGr8
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 17, 2015, 11:27:58 pm
content: Quote from: alin_im on April 17, 2015, 11:24:18 pmIf they are the authorized distributor then who cares? Have you seen Brymen's website?HereIt looks like it is 1996 geocities but they make some of the best meters handheld meters in the world.The dristributor that TopLoser linked to is their OFFICIAL distributor, that is ALL you need to care about. THey even list their prices (they carry both the Silver and the blue/yellow one) which many distributors don't do.

author: rx8pilot
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 17, 2015, 11:41:12 pm
content: Quote from: alin_im on April 17, 2015, 11:24:18 pmThat site tells me that you may need to fax your order over and pay with a check, but you will probably get a real Hakko product. Bad websites turn me away immediately. Not sure if that is a good reaction or not, but I want vendors to be current with the times.

author: TopLoser
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 17, 2015, 11:51:14 pm
content: They ask for a bank transfer, or a cheque (whatever that is these days!)Nothing unusual, I often wish I could insist on bank transfers and save 3.5% charges on each sale.

author: rx8pilot
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 18, 2015, 12:06:19 am
content: Bank transfers usually have a fixed fee (here in the USA anyhow). I only use them for large orders. For an FX-888 the bank fee would probably be more than 3.5%.Total PITA for a soldering iron.

author: TopLoser
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: April 18, 2015, 12:16:40 am
content: Totally free in the UK, and payment received within minutes.For a bank transfer to another European country I pay a 3 euro charge and it's normally received same day.Whenever I buy goods I always try and pay by bank transfer as a courtesy to the seller, PayPal might be convenient but it's a very expensive convenience.

author: PedroDaGr8
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 18, 2015, 12:27:36 am
content: Quote from: rx8pilot on April 18, 2015, 12:06:19 ambank Transfers there are like check's here. Very common and more or less free. A colleague of mine visiting from Austria was quite surpised that rent is paid via check (which costs in Austria) and not bank transfer (which is free there)

author: nanofrog
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 18, 2015, 02:09:46 am
content: If you don't want to deal with dancap, you could also purchase frombatterfly.com( would need to swap the plug). Should be a bit less expensive as well, at ~100GBP to your door if my math is right (98EUR + 16.66EUR shipping & 20% VAT).

author: smjcuk
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 18, 2015, 06:32:37 am
content: You can get respectable cheap clones here:http://www.pcb-soldering.co.ukMine has been a joy to use even coming from a nice temp controlled Weller TCP iron.RoHS, fused IEC sockets, UK plugs and properly tagged earthing. They also ship tonnes of spares and have large stock. Plus you can go and collect if you live near Broxbourne. Nice people to deal with.Only thing is tip temperature needed calibrating which took 5 mins with a thermocouple and a meter. Oh and their solder is crap so I got a big spool of loctite 60/40 multicore off eBay.

author: JoeD
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: April 18, 2015, 09:14:07 pm
content: Hakko has another official distributor in the UK if you want to deal with a company with a more conventional website.http://www.grosvenor-group.comDancap has been around for a long time and their service is good even if their practices are a bit old fashioned.JoeD

author: sotos
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: April 19, 2015, 09:04:21 am
content: For Hakko there’s also an Italian distributor here.http://www.batterfly.com/shop/stazioni_saldantiHis also an EEVblog member, if you send him a message he can give you a better price.Also, different payment methods.

author: FlevasGR
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: April 19, 2015, 02:14:53 pm
content: I bought mine from a shop called RobotStore which is based in Greece and it's an official SparkFun distributor. They send wordwide and the shiping is okay. Take a look:http://robotstore.gr/

author: mariush
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: April 19, 2015, 02:31:05 pm
content: Grosvenor Group has local presence here in Romania, but when I called them last year a nice gentlemen told me they only deal with companies. It's the same in other countries as well.Around the same time last year, I emailed Dancap but they didn't even bother to reply to my email. Shit website, shit customer service, out for good and for ever in my book, they don't exist for me. I guess they only sell to UK people, but still not even replying to an email is just rude.Anyway, the Grosvenor employee was willing to make an exception for me and make a special order but the best price he could for the fx-888 do was about 120-130 euro plus local VAT of 24% so about 160 euro or about 180-190$ at that time's exchange rate. In contrast, the US version was available in stores like Sparkfan or Adafruit for $95 and an authorized distributor had the US version on eBay listed for around $82. However, due to weight, the shipping costs were about $40-60.I ended up buying a genuine Hakko 936 from a guy in Israel and replaced the plug with the Euro one and it still works great. I use this and a Pace HW50 (bought from eBay as well) depending on what I need to solder