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When soldering insulated wires, to large heat absorbing posts and lugs, I ran into the problem of PVC, and some other jacket materials, melting, shrinking and pulling back.
Lately I've been heavily tinning large-mass connectors, like Cardas binding posts, and tinning the wires. The joint can then be made pretty quickly and jacket melt back is very minimal.
When soldering the tinned wire to the tinned binding post, I hold the post in a small vise and the wire in a third hand clip. I position the tinned wire such that it is pushing down against the tinning on the post.
I hold the soldering tip against both the tinned wire and tinning on the post. When the solder melts the wire sinks into the tinning on the post, such that it probably rests against the post, and I add a tad more rosin filled solder. So far the joints end up very shiny and work well. I'm using 6347 leaded solder. Is this a bad practice?
Follow Ups:
Your method is fine, especially for high-mass pure copper connectors which tend to require high-heat temperatures. I suggest going a step further, and use additional solder when making the solder joint. A dependable solder joint can be created by quickly touching the tip of a soldering iron to both the moderately tinned areas of the connector and wire, along with a flow of fresh solder at the same time. This is the best approach I've found when making difficult solder joints.
Thanks for the reply. In my post I mention that I add a tad of solder after the wire sinks into the tinning of the post.
Do you have an iron with a temp readout? It would be nice to know your temp. Also if you do overheat the wire coating just add some heat shrink to reinforce it.
ET
ET
"If at first you don't succeed, keep on sucking till you do suck seed" - Curly Howard 1936
I mentioned, in my post, that I have a Metcal. It's model ps-900. No readout but works great.
Sorry, I missed that. I would want to be around 800 degrees to quickly solder without heating the insulation which in my experience happens with too low a temp over too much time.
ET
"If at first you don't succeed, keep on sucking till you do suck seed" - Curly Howard 1936
Sorry, I missed that. I would want to be around 800 degrees to quickly solder without heating the insulation which in my experience happens with too low a temp over too much time.
ET
"If at first you don't succeed, keep on sucking till you do suck seed" - Curly Howard 1936
Thanks for the reply. I agree about the "to low heat". My problem was happening with an old Velleman and it took along time for things to get hot enough.
I've soldered wires to small lugs with the Metcal and it only takes a few seconds. I will be trying the Metcal on the massive Cardas posts soon.
That is not the best way to solder. The wire should be wrapped around the post so that you have a solid electrical and mechanical connection without any solder at all. Ideally the solder is only there to keep things from vibrating apart and to seal the connection from oxidation.Right now you're using the solder as glue, and listening to the solder, not the wire and the binding post. And if there is even slight movement of the post or wire while the solder is solidifying, you'll end up with a cold solder joint. It may look OK from the outside, but you could have a really poor connection under the surface. Try securing the wire to the binding post, and then put your iron just on the binding post (close to the wire) and heating it until the solder starts to flow on it. Then move the iron so that it contacts both the post and wire. The wire takes much less time to reach the solder melting temp than the post.
Edits: 09/07/16
Always mechanical connection then solder.
What bcowen explained above is just what was told to us in the electronics tech course. Make the mechanical joint first then solder to lock it in.
Hi, I have found this tool to be useful when soldering wires that have insulation that tends to melt.
"It is better to remain silent and thought a fool, then speak and remove all doubt." A. Lincoln
Thanks for the info. I'll try the Metcal with just tinned wire. If the insulation still melts back I'll give the tweezers a try.
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