Ya I do all of that, either my solder sucks or my iron sucks. My iron is pretty decent digital 60watt and it says it goes up to 842 degrees but my temp gun says the tip only gets to 290. I can barely melt the solder on the plug to tin it much less get enough heat into the wire to melt the solder on that. The wire gets hot as hell, hot enough to melt the insulation but the heat won't stay on the joint. It's frustrating as all hell.