Hi Ben,
I had the pleasure of adding one of the "ColdHeat" Soldering Irons to my toolkit 4 or so years ago. This is a battery powered soldering iron which ran off 4 AA batteries. It was an awesome addition to my cars tool kit, as well as allowing me to do soldering work safely in my uni dorm room.
My later experience repairing 1.1kV trailing cables used in mining applications gave me insights as to how this worked. In that job, I often used a carbon arc soldering iron. This is what I believe this iron is.
It has a split carbon/ceramic tip that heats the conductor it is touching. This process is nearly instantaneous and the tip then cools in seconds to a touchable heat.
I was thinking that this might make for a safer soldering tip for a soldering finger.
Let me know what you think.
Clinton, Brisbane Australia.
