What's there to say? It's a block of ammonium chloride, it weighs about half a pound, it'll tin your soldering iron tip when it won't wet any more. Anyone who said it didn't work must've done it wrong. To be clear, this isn't meant to replace regular tip maintenance. You still clean it with the standard brass wool pad and wet sponge, as necessary. You still tin the tip with some solder when not using it for a few minutes. Sometimes though, your tip will get dirty and/or build up oxidation. The solder balls up and doesn't wet on the tip properly. That's when you bust out the sal ammoniac.

Build up some melted, balled up solder on the tip, then just jab it into the block. Rub it back and forth, twist it clockwise, counter-clockwise. You'll see a lot of smoke and pretty soon you'll see the solder spread over the tip like when it was new. At this point I'll give the tip a good clean with the brass pad then reapply some solder. Then admire how it wets as good as new. Oh yeah that's nice.

If you were trying to clean your soldering irons this cleaning product will clean them super clean even if they are old. It worked great for me.

I don't remember where I first heard about sal ammoniac but I've known about it for most of my life. At 67, this is the first time I've actually had a chunk of it in my possession. It's wonderful stuff folks. If you use a soldering iron, you need this mineral to keep your tip clean. Now, a 1/2 lb block is a significant quantity and with the amount of occasional soldering I do, I figure I can leave what's left of my chunk (which will be most of it) to my son as part of his inheritance. And then he can leave it to his son and then he can leave it to his heirs and on and on... Has other uses too - smelting, baking (really). Keep it dry!

Everyone that solders wore should have this. You really need to work the iron into the block to clean it . Once you do that you will see how much crap came off the tip . I learned alot just by watching u tube videos on it. Best thing about it as well as doing a great job it will last a guy a lifetime!

I bought an 1960's era American Beauty 100 watt soldering iron for a few dollars at a hamfest a few years ago. It appeared to be almost new, except for an oxidized/corroded tip. The tip was the original high quality iron-plated one, but one face was oxidized completely black, and no solder would stick to it. I heated the iron to working temperature, melted a blob of solder onto the sal ammoniac block, and rolled the tip around on the block with the solder blob for about 5 minutes until the oxidation was gone and the solder tinned the tip. Good as new. There are plenty of youtube videos demonstrating this. Many youtube videos also demonstrate filing or sanding the tip. Do NOT do this. Once the iron plating is worn through, the tip will oxidize and wear away much faster. Use sal ammoniac to remove the oxidation without abrading the tip. The vapor emitted where the iron heated the sal ammoniac did not seem any more noxious than those of typical soldering fluxes, but of course you should use this product in a well-ventilated workspace.