Soldering wires

Delawaresurfman · Sep 8, 2016

I'm having trouble soldering wires. I'm using a pencil solderer and automotive wiring. When heating up the ring to solder the wire it is melting the insulation before and when the solder melts. I think I'm using the right solder with external flux. What am I doing wrong? Any suggestions? Thanks, John.

BarnyardEngineering · Sep 8, 2016

It's taking too long to heat up the metal. Either your soldering iron is dirty, or it's not big enough for the job.

Wipe your soldering iron off on a damp sponge before each soldering operation so you have a nice shiny tinned surface on the tip. The oxidized solder that forms after a few seconds of sitting does not conduct heat well.

I only use Radio Shack rosin core solder. No flux necessary.

Also are the rings bare or are they the crimp type with insulated boots on them? If they are the crimp type the boots are not designed for the heat of soldering. Remove them before soldering. They just pop off when you grab them with a needle nose pliers.

rfazio · Sep 8, 2016

How many watts is the pencil soldering iron? Most likely it's a low wattage unit, 25 watts? Soldering a ring terminal onto wire can be done that way but it is harder. You may not have a soldering gun, but that would make it a lot easier. Here are Fazio's steps to soldering. Taught to me by my mother!

1. Make sure the tip of the iron is clean and shinny, file and re-tin if necessary.

2. Heat up the iron first.

2. Once the iron can melt the solder easily, place it on the wire, ring terminal, what ever you want to solder. Keep touching the solder to the space between the iron and item to be soldered. The goal is to make a small puddle between the iron and item to be soldered.

3. The puddle will transfer the heat to the item to be soldered much faster than trying to heat the item by just touching it with the iron.

4. Once you have a small puddle that stays melted you can add solder to the joint. In the case of a ring terminal you can start pushing solder into the open end near the ring.

What you are probably doing is heating the item too much and too long so the insulation starts melting. Try my method with a piece of solid copper wire with an inch skinned clean. practice a little with that until you get the hang of tinning the end of it. Then go back to your ring terminal. When I solder an ring terminal I usually hold the gun on the ring right at the point where the wire ends in the barrel. Now as you add solder it flows into the barrel. If your ring terminal has insulation on it then it is not meant to be soldered, but crimped with a crimping tool

Hope this helps.

Richard

da.bees · Sep 8, 2016

You need 200 or more watts for what you are doing. Same as gas brazeing and soldering,you must have enough heat to get in and get out quickly,else heat conduct's away from joint fast as it's generated.

old · Sep 8, 2016

#1 sounds like the wrong solder. You need Rosin core solder for wires. I have solder so much stuff over the years I hate doing it any more but I was a Navy E.T.

#2 you need to tin the iron which means you melt some solder on tip so that will help heat transfer faster.

#3 clamp a heat sink on the wire just behind where your going to solder . A set of hemostats work well for that. BTDT to many times

jniolon · Sep 8, 2016

one other thing to consider... what is the ring sitting on when you apply the heat ?? if you're laying the ring/wire on a metal work bench or top... the metal bench is soaking up all your heat... you should be soldering in air held with a set of hemostats or on a piece of non heat conducting material... a board or even holding it with a set of pliers is better than on the bench top

john

MarkB_MI · Sep 8, 2016

There are two secrets to soldering electrical connections: A wet tip and clean conductors. The wire needs to be shiny copper unless it's already tinned.

Keep a wet sponge next to where you're working. Once your iron is hot, wipe it off on the sponge. If the tip doesn't come out shiny, STOP! You'll have to clean and tin the tip before you can do anything else.

Assuming your tip is shiny after you wipe it on the sponge, take your solder and put a dab on the tip. It doesn't take much, but the tip MUST BE WET. For a PC board connection, it just takes a tiny drop. For heavy wires, get as much on the iron as it will hold.

Touch the wet tip to conductors. If the conductors are clean, they should immediately wick up the excess solder, which will cause heat to quickly transfer from the iron to the conductors. Now touch your solder to the CONDUCTORS. If everything is right, they'll quickly suck up enough solder and you can remove the tip and solder from the conductors.

Delawaresurfman · Sep 8, 2016

Thanks for the tips. I'll check wattage of the iron. All parts are new, no old wiring. I did tin the tip and keep everything clean. I'll use the heat sink and I did have the work in the air. No plastic on the rings as I plan to shrink wrap the connectors. Thanks and want to get this right. Practice will make perfect, John

dr sportster · Sep 8, 2016

Wet sponge . mmm I remember that from the old Heathkit assembly projects.

circus · Sep 8, 2016

I like to clean, flux and solder the wires separately using a drip of melted solder hanging from the iron. Then lap the two, and melt the presoldered ends together.

guido · Sep 8, 2016

Hello delawaresurfman,

Make sure the tip is tight. Heat gets it loose . Solder wire is available in.020 size for small work. Here is how I do it, then shrink wrap,

Guido.

old · Sep 8, 2016

It is also a good idea to wash your hands after working with solder. If you did a lot of soldering over the years one can get heavy metal poisoning. I have a friend who was in the navy with me and he now suffers with heavy metal poisoning due to all the solder he did when in the Navy

Texasmark1 · Sep 8, 2016

Absolutely. I have a 250W iron for those jobs for that reason. Take that and what everybody else said and you are good to go. HF has the irons cheap. I bought the 250 for soldering brushes in Ford starters. On sensitive electronic circuitry, you need a little iron (25-35 w), .020 dia 63-37 (lead-tin), rosin core solder for a low temp melt, and the hemostats to the leads to sink heat from the sensitive electronic components.

But this is different.....brute force.

Delawaresurfman · Sep 8, 2016

Lord in not trying wire that size. Just 12-14 gauge!

Texasmark1 · Sep 9, 2016

Heathkits.................Man you are ageing yourself. Grin. I remember a VTVM (which I still have), 20 watt transistorized stereo amplifier and a depth finder (for fishing) when depth finders first came out.

I made a wooden box with a handle, like folks used to build for hand carrying their tools. I put it and a small 12v battery in the box and took it with me when I rented boats. Transducer had suction cups to hold it to the boat. It was a neon flasher, like they had in the early days but still did the job.

Leroy · Sep 9, 2016

What do you do when it melts the tip befor it melts the solder. I have a Weller 8200 N soldering gun rated at 120V, 60 cy, 1.2 A, 100/140 watts and never could get the solder to melt, the tip melts so that it bends drops from weight of tip before the solder will melt. This is using several new tips to try to get it working.

Bob · Sep 9, 2016

You have to keep the tip clean and tinned. Apply a drop of solder to the tip, then touch the tip to the wires to be solder/work. The solder on the tip makes contact between the tip and the work and transfers heat. As the work warms up, apply solder to the WORK.

dr sportster · Sep 9, 2016

That is funny. I can't help but think what do kids do these days there is no Heathkit store. Ha those were fun . I did the lower price stereo receiver [ great sound] , the CDI ignition. A Tune-up meter , and I think one other meter. I always wanted to build the exhaust gas analyzer.

JGayman · Sep 9, 2016

You have the wrong solder. It almost sounds like you have silver solder. You need to be using 60/40 Rosin core solder, you want thin stuff, around 0.062" diameter.

JGayman · Sep 9, 2016

I sure miss Heathkit. I built all kinds of kits... oscilloscope, VTVM, tone generator, signal tracer, B&W TV. I also had all types of Heathkit HAM equipment. At the time, well built Heathkit radio gear was top notch.

guido · Sep 9, 2016

Hello delawaresurman,

You have missed my point............ totally! You need to apply heat to the terminal end! Whet it gets hot enough solder will flow into the joint. This will happen assuming your are using the right solder get the terminal hot enough with the right tool. Also holding the wire in a vice will prevent the heat to be absorbed away from the joint. If you do not tin the iron tip, it will become passive(will not get hot), and will not melt the solder regardless of size. Yours is probably like the little one in the picture. Those small ones are-were designed for printed circuit boards, and very thin solder. The center soldering iron in the picture would do the job.

Guido.

guido · Sep 9, 2016

Hello dr sportster,

I got some of those heatkits in the garage. Finally fried my timing light last year, still got my tune up meter with the R.P.M. induction cable from the late 60's70's. That was high tech in those days! Wow, that is awhile back. I still have all the assembly manuals, and the instruction booklet on how to solder,

Guido.

Texasmark1 · Sep 9, 2016

You guys are dating yourselves.....grin. I turn 75 this month.

John,PA · Sep 9, 2016

HEY DELAWARE......This here is JOHN,PA.

tHE LATEST SOLDERING THENIQUE IS: BERNZ-oMATIC....LOWES.

Us'n butane cigar lighter to solder stuff. Highly technical procedures, now.

NO JUICE needed. Just butane refillable type stuff.

CHECK IT OUT!

John,PA Old timer DuPont engineering dept.

bill b va · Sep 10, 2016

Old if you have done that much soldering you must have heard of using salamonac (sp) to clean soldering irons . by the way shouldn't that be soldering coppers and not irons.

old · Sep 10, 2016

Have not heard of salamonac but then again I got out of that line of work back in the 80s. Last place I did much soldering at was a TV repair shop which now days a things of the past since now instead of repairing a TV you throw it away. The place also made printed circuit boards for things like the clap lamps you know the ones you clapped your hand and they turned on and also the touch lamps where you touched the lamp and it came on. Bet I drilled a couple million holes with a computer operated drilling machine

Soldering wires

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