You only want as much silicone thermal grease as it takes to fill the
imperfections in the mating surfaces, not so much as to separate them.
You want METAL to METAL contact when it can happen. Too much thermal
grease is worse than none at all. Apply it then wipe most of it off.
I've only damaged one silicon semiconductor with soldering heat in the
last 40 years. It was a microwave schottky diode soldered to a 1/4"
diameter copper tube. Then the first soldering didn't hurt it, it was
taking it off and the soldering it back again that did the damage. I
spent part of a summer building 100 stage shift registers with three
silicon transistors per stage and not enough room for heat sink tweezers
that I bought for the project. The professor didn't think I needed to
care and I didn't.
You might do more damage with a marginally small soldering iron than one
way too big because the small iron will have to be on the joint for a
much longer time.
Gerald
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