[HCARC] Solder Question

[Gary J - N5BAA]

Kerry, Derrell,

Yes, I was asking for a simple(r) answer.  All of the fittings I have are 
silver plated.  The center pins on the N connectors (the only thing I need 
to solder are either silver or gold plated).  Derrell - I understand clean, 
but inside a new pin and with newly stripped coax it's hard to CLEAN anymore 
than shiny fresh copper and the pin is far too small to clean inside of. 
AND one wonders why I have changed over to crimp connectors - it becomes 
more obvious to me each time I ask a question.  How does one recognize a 
solder free connector pin??  For the life of me, I have never seen a Spec on 
any site, on any catalog, in any magazine, etc (no where) where they have 
indicated that the connector or it's parts were for lead free, or leaded 
solder.  How confusing does this have to get and then why isn't there some 
discussion about this kind of thing included in any of the tests/books for a 
Ham License??  Studying for my Expert test, I can easily find a few sections 
of that manual that could be dropped in favor of one that might help someone 
put together a station.  What do people who don't have access to a Reflector 
do to find this info out??  Maybe it's not all my poor soldering ability 
after all - that is hardly comforting though.

Kerry - did you see my question on how far apart antennas should be on Field 
Day to allow more than one station to be on the same meter band??  So far I 
have had no responses (which considering anything to do with Field Day is 
not overly surprising).  I guess I am going to have to take the club trailer 
down to the Red Cross and put up an antenna and do a test run with several 
radios to find out.

Gary J
N5BAA

-----Original Message----- 
From: Kerry Sandstrom
Sent: Thursday, October 9, 2014 5:53 PM
To: Gary J - N5BAA ; hcarc at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [HCARC] Solder Question

Gary,

I bet you thought you asked a simple question?  Not a chance!  Are the N
connectors new and for lead-free solder or are they old and for tin-lead
solder?

In the old days solder was usually tin and lead.  The ratio of tin to
lead was normally about 60/40 tin to lead.  The lowest melting point
tin-lead solder is 63/37.  63/37 solder melts at 361 deg F, 60/40 at 371
deg F and as the lead content gets higher, so does the melting point.
New, lead-free solder is tin-copper.  It has higher melting point than
the old tin-lead.

There are several other types of solder such as tin-bismuth and silver
solder.  They have special properties, for instance bismuth solder has a
very low melting point and silver-solder is used for soldering to to
metal contacts deposited on ceramic standoffs.  If you want to see
silver solder look inside an old Tektronix oscilloscope.

It is difficult if not impossible to use tin-lead solder to solder new
components designed to use lead-free solder and vice versa.  I'm not
sure how one solders a tinned center conductor to a lead-free center pin
and vice versa.  That is probably one advantage of going the crimp
connector root.  By the way numerous transistors, diodes, resistors,
capacitors, cables, connectors, etc are now made lead-free and are
terrible to work with if you are using tin-lead solder.  You can't tin
the leads and solder won't stick to the leads of the components.  I
think the lead-free stuff is marked ROHS or something like that.

Have fun,

Kerry



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