i am finding its a bit like glass making

gotta develop a feel for it.

you have to be ultra careful, because if you are not the PCB will start poping. and bad things will happen.

i am very impatient so i always use the heat gun on HIGH.

FLUX helps me gage how hot the pcb is.

the flux goes through some stages, when it starts to blue smoke that tells you too hot! back off asap! but mainly with it on

high were talking about like 8-10 seconds, and about 4-6 inches of distance. but yeah i control my heat by distance between the pcb and the heatgun.

also i pre heat the component, while i am waiting for the pads to heat up, i learned that from tig welding, keeping the filler rod close so it says at temperature.

i only mask when i need to.

i suggest practicing on some junk pcb, i use flux to solder and de solder.

its nice when the pads are all fluxed, and melted, and you set the I/C on there and it floats and self centers