[TowerTalk] Re: Cutting braid

[W2RU - Bud Hippisley]

What I haven't seen mentioned in this series of postings about properly installing PL-259 connectors is a recommended wattage for the soldering iron or gun.  My experience has been that all these techniques being shared by everyone only work if the iron or gun is hot enough to _quickly_ tin (and, later, solder to the connector) the coax cable braid and center conductor.  Melted dielectric is the real bugaboo for many of us, not lack of strength from failure to solder the braid or center conductor to the corresponding part of the PL-259 metalwork.  In years past, I have made some of the strongest short-circuits you can imagine....:-)

Bud, W2RU

At 04:40 2005-01-16, Tom Rauch wrote:
>> It's easier if you tin the braid before you cut it (with a
>copper tubing
>> cutter).
>
>If you fully tin the braid, all you need to do is scribe it
>with a carpet knife then bend it and it will cleanly crack
>at the scribe mark.