[TowerTalk] Joining two perpendicular wires

[David Gilbert]

It's the tin in solder that weathers from moisture.  The water leaches 
out the tin and leaves a soft, porous matrix that has very little 
strength.  The white powder you often see is the lead oxidizing after 
the tin has gone.  The less tin the better, but unfortunately that also 
usually raises the melting temperature. Plumbing solder is a bit of a 
compromise, but lasts much longer than standard lead-tin solder.

Solder of any kind should never be used for structural strength, which I 
why I agreed with the folks who suggested using some other means (like a 
rope) to handle the tension and then leave a loose tail for the 
electrical connection (solder, split bolt, whatever).

73,
Dave   AB7E



On 7/13/2021 5:45 AM, Lux, Jim wrote:
> On 7/13/21 4:52 AM, john at kk9a.com wrote:
>> Like many posts, this went off on a tangent. If it was for connecting 
>> two
>> parallel wires, I would have suggested the western-union splice. I 
>> use this
>> splice all the time on dipoles and Beverages. I use regular lead solder
>> without issue but perhaps they are not up long enough to see lead
>> degradation. Interesting post on using plumbing solder, that should be
>> easier to use on the tower than silver solder.
>>
>> John KK9A
>>
>>
>
> Plumbing solder is still soft solder, used to be 50/50 lead/tin but is 
> now Tin, Copper, Nickel, and Silver (and other stuff with low melting 
> points like indium), but is still not hard solder, and is not structural.
>
> brazing and hard soldering uses higher melting alloys (high silver 
> content, copper) and is significantly stronger, and much less likely 
> to become brittle than the tin based alloys used for soft soldering.
>
>
> I don't know that solder degrades from weather, per se (i.e. it 
> doesn't oxidize or chemically change from exposure to air and water) 
> However, it work hardens easily, so mechanical loading or temperature 
> cycling (which creates mechanical loading in some cases) can make it 
> brittle. Soft solder also has creep and deformation under constant 
> load.  Tin/lead solders can form two kinds of crystals, so cracks can 
> develop between the crystals, which combined with temperature cycling, 
> can cause degradation.