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#1
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Soldering
Hello, I am trying to solder some silver wire, D shaped 8mm x 2mm (into a
bangle) and I am having problems. Firstly the solder runs away from the top of the join leaving a gap, secondly the heat is starting to damage the edge. I have a few to do and the first is a reject (no real problem I will have it) but I want to do a decent job. |
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#2
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Soldering
"Test This!" wrote in message ... Hello, I am trying to solder some silver wire, D shaped 8mm x 2mm (into a bangle) and I am having problems. Firstly the solder runs away from the top of the join leaving a gap, secondly the heat is starting to damage the edge. I had the same problem myself when I started making bangles. I'll assume that you have prepared both edges you need soldered carefully and that all is clean, fluxed and that you are using the correct silver solder. The edges of the 'D' shaped wire need to fit closely throughout the joint to be soldered. This is harder in a curved shape like a bangle because if the end of the wire has been cut and or filed at a right angle, when you bend the wire round in a curve the outside edge (the top of the joint) doesn't quite come together. Solder will not fill this gap and will run away. 1) I sometimes clamp the bangle in a vice with a small section of the wire overlapping side by side and cut through the two sections of wire with a saw. 2) You can also file the joints to the correct angle after bending them round into the bangle shape. i.e. bring both ends together then insert a thin file between the ends and carefully file the ends to the same angle. 3) My favourite method is to file both ends square and bring them round in a kind of squashed oval shape so the wire ends meet squarely. Push the ends past each other, then pull them back carefully and let them click into place by 'spring' action. Place a small square of solder on a charcoal block (or whatever you use as a soldering surface) place the bangle on the block so that the joint rest exactly on the square of solder and flux it well. Heat the whole bangle evenly not just the joint area with a large flame, not to fierce and the solder will flow into the joint as soon as it becomes fluid. Remove the heat immediately. After pickling and drying tap the bangle into the correct shape on a bangle triblet. (I always, if possible, make bangles about a size too small and stretch them on the bangle triblet to the size I need. This gets you to the exact size easily and work hardens the silver making it less likely to deform in use.) NB the better the fit of the joint the better the flow of the solder. The edges were probably getting dammaged by you heating for too long trying to fill the joint. Try a few with some copper wire first until you have built some experience and confidence. I have a few to do and the first is a reject (no real problem I will have it) but I want to do a decent job. Best of luck - Kendall |
#3
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Soldering
hi test this.
Had a similar problem a while ago and its a real bugger. Have you tried using steel/titanium binding wire on the silver wire itself ? http://www.silverstall.com/soldering...jewellery.html |
#4
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Soldering
On Wed, 20 Jun 2007 16:10:51 +0000, Test This! wrote:
Hello, I am trying to solder some silver wire, D shaped 8mm x 2mm (into a bangle) and I am having problems. Firstly the solder runs away from the top of the join leaving a gap, secondly the heat is starting to damage the edge. http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/consol.htm http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/solder-life.htm |
#5
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Soldering
On Wed, 20 Jun 2007 09:10:43 -0700, in rec.crafts.jewelry "Test This!"
wrote: Hello, I am trying to solder some silver wire, D shaped 8mm x 2mm (into a bangle) and I am having problems. Firstly the solder runs away from the top of the join leaving a gap, secondly the heat is starting to damage the edge. I have a few to do and the first is a reject (no real problem I will have it) but I want to do a decent job. Most of the basics well covered by what others have already said, but a few comments, just in case. The more closely fit your joint, the less you'll get a gap. Solder, when it melts, starts to diffuse into and slightly dissolve some of the parent metal of the joint. With a tight joint and no excess solder, this isn't a problem. With a loose joint however, you end up using more solder, and the degree to which there is enough solder to dissolve some of the joint metal, increases. When this happens, in effect, the joint gets even wider and less fitted than it was. Sharp corners of the wire suffer the most, but it also will give you that depression or gap all around the joint. To some degree, when this happens, you can compensate by adding more solder to fill in the gap, and if you don't overheat, this can work, but it's sloppy, and good craftsmanship in the first place makes this sort of stop gap fix unnecessary. Be sure that in addition to your joint being tightly fitted and clean, that you've got good flux, AND that the solder itself is clean and bright. That will help it flow easier and more quickly, helping you avoid overheating. Use of a higher melting point solder, in contrast to intuition, will also make some of these problems go away. Hard solder will have much less tendancy to dissolve parent metal in the joint, than will easy, for example. And it flows more easily in a nice tight joint once you get it to temperture. Be sure you're heating the joint, not the solder itself. The solder should get much or most of it's heating from the metal being joined. That avoids overheating/boiling the solder before the joint is hot enough. Although it may seem that easy solder, might be safer and easier to use than a medium or hard solder due to the lower melting point, once you've got some practice controlling the heat to get both sides of the joint, and with silver, often most of the piece itself, hot enough, then you'll find that the higher melting point solders are in fact, easier to use and give better results with less of that "etching" away of corners and edges of the wire. Bangles and other large hoops etc can be difficult to hold, since the sheer size of the loop coupled with relatively small wire (relative to the diameter of the loop) can mean that as you heat, sometimes simple annealing of the wire as you heat up the joint can let the wire relax, letting the joint open up a bit. So be sure you're soldering set up is such that the metal is supported in a way that the joint stays closed. Binding wire is one method, and may be best for you, but I'd probably try simpler methods first, Others are just in how you support or hold the bangle. Gravity can work with you, or against you here. For example, a bangle held vertically, seam at the top, just sitting on a flat surface, as it heats, the joint will tend to open if the metal softens and the sides relax or sag a trace. The same position (I'm assuming something like a third hand holding it vertical, but sitting instead on two small blocks at 4 oclock and 8 oclock, will mean that the sides of the bangle, as the metal relaxes and wants to move, will be pulled by gravity towards the middle, thus helping the joint stay closed. Or use T-pins or "staples" to hold the bangle down flat on a charcoal or soldering block, thus holding the joint closed mechanically. Etc. Etc. Peter |
#6
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Soldering
On Wed, 20 Jun 2007 16:10:51 +0000, Test This! wrote:
Firstly the solder runs away from the top of the join leaving a gap, secondly the heat is starting to damage the edge. http://www.handyharmancanada.com/The...Book/bbook.htm |
#7
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Soldering
On Thu, 21 Jun 2007 01:29:53 +0000, Peter W.. Rowe, wrote:
Hard solder will have much less tendancy to dissolve parent metal in the joint, than will easy, for example. And it flows more easily in a nice tight joint once you get it to temperture. Be sure you're heating the joint, not the solder itself. The solder should get much or most of it's heating from the metal being joined. That avoids overheating/boiling the solder before the joint is hot enough. Although it may seem that easy solder, might be safer and easier to use than a medium or hard solder due to the lower melting point, once you've got some practice controlling the heat to get both sides of the joint, and with silver, often most of the piece itself, hot enough, then you'll find that the higher melting point solders are in fact, easier to use and give better results with less of that "etching" away of corners and edges of the wire. Burning out zinc by overheating blows out pits like little erupting volcanoes. You can overheat low melting silver solders more before the parent metal collapses, and they have more zinc to burn out. You will see pitting after using any solder -- if you do not remove heat after it flows. |
#8
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Soldering
On Wed, 20 Jun 2007 23:40:57 -0700, in rec.crafts.jewelry mbstevens
wrote: On Thu, 21 Jun 2007 01:29:53 +0000, Peter W.. Rowe, wrote: Hard solder will have much less tendancy to dissolve parent metal in the joint, than will easy, for example. And it flows more easily in a nice tight joint once you get it to temperture. Be sure you're heating the joint, not the solder itself. The solder should get much or most of it's heating from the metal being joined. That avoids overheating/boiling the solder before the joint is hot enough. Although it may seem that easy solder, might be safer and easier to use than a medium or hard solder due to the lower melting point, once you've got some practice controlling the heat to get both sides of the joint, and with silver, often most of the piece itself, hot enough, then you'll find that the higher melting point solders are in fact, easier to use and give better results with less of that "etching" away of corners and edges of the wire. Burning out zinc by overheating blows out pits like little erupting volcanoes. You can overheat low melting silver solders more before the parent metal collapses, and they have more zinc to burn out. You will see pitting after using any solder -- if you do not remove heat after it flows. True enough, of course. But the effect you're talking about requires heating the solder rather more than what I'm talking about. You're actually overheating the solder enough to burn off the zinc. I'm talking about what happens, especially with more prolonged heating, if the temperature is any significant amount over the flow point of the solder. This can be only a little bit over, still well before you're burning off the zinc. And it's mostly a problem when there is too much solder being used. Normally, with an appropriate amount of solder, when it flows, the molten metal is raised above it's melting point. At that temperature, it can dissolve a bit of the solid silver from the joint, and still remain liquid, But if the amount of solder is correct, the amount of silver dissolved into the liquid is small, stopped when the mix reaches equalibrium for that temp, and at the same time, diffusion of the copper and zinc into the parent metal also raises the melting point of the liquid pool. In short, the liquid, even without lowering the temperature, will solidify as the composition of the liquid pool is altered by removal of the copper and zinc, and addition of silver. In a good well done joint, the drawing into of the molten solder of joint silver is small enough to be hidden by the overall solder joint. If, however, too much solder is used, such as in a poorly fitted joint, then it will allow the molten solder to attack the joint metal substantially more, altering the final look of the joint, often with an etched/depressed zone at the joint. All this can happen well below the temperatures at which the zinc is actually volatilized, and one can get this effect without seeing lots of pinholes and pits in the solder. Of course, if you get the joint hot enough to also get pitting and blowholes, well, so much the worse. cheers Peter |
#9
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Soldering
Thanks
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#10
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Soldering
I think I'll experiment with some steel wire I have around - looks like I
need my plumbers type blow lamp as well as the mini torch has difficulties and the first one relaxed and spread a little as I ended up using a gas hob for plenty of heat.!!!! |
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