Recently sorted out a box of wire I picked up somewhere. In it were a number of terminal rail joiners, with what apppear to be brass joiners. Can I use the brass joiners on nickel silver track or will I get some sort of adverse reaction?
Thank you for your time,
Richard
To my knowledge there are no weird electrochemical or potential issues with these, e.g. dangerous effect of galvanic couples between alloying elements merely in the presence of typical humidity conditions on a layout, and of course if you use them primarily to line up the rail ends mechanically to solder the joint the conductivity will be relatively assured.
Problem is that the brass joiners will oxidize just like any other brass, and eventually if you don’t solder the joint this is likely to cause many of the same sort of joint problems you’d get in straight brass track. Few if any effective cleaning methods will reach the contact areas inside the joiners, too. Unless you paint the railsides you’ll see the yellow metal color, and the discolored ‘dirty’ color, over time, and if you do paint them the paint can preferentially wick into the joint and cause contact issues there… and there are contaminants – perhaps in track-cleaning solutions, perhaps in cat pee or other ‘surprises’ – that might quickly and effectively start galvanic action going…
If you do decide to use them, clean them very thoroughly (I’d even ‘reverse-electroplate’ them a few seconds to be sure to get the inside crannies really, really clean and then passivate them well, immediately before assembling them) just as you would for copper.
Galvanic corrosion between nickel silver and brass should not be extreme; there are online charts, you can investigate and judge for yourself whether it’s a risk you can live with.
Thank you both for the responses.
I probably could use them, but why take a chance. Besides I can use making new ones to pratice my soldering skills. Sort of what I was thinking .
Thanks again,
Richard
I admit I’m in awe. Buy the sheet metal, etch or cut out or punch the outlines, make a jig and then progressively bend the ears over, and then get the right combination of rail insertability and spring to hold it steady.
The closest I ever came to such a thing was mulling over making rail joiners with built-in fishplate detail (to hide the actual ‘joiner’ and visible rail gap as much as possible) and I lost heart over all the steps. Let’s see organized pictures of how you do this…
If the rail joiners are clean, and you are going to solder the joint, you should never need to worry about any problems.
-Kevin
I have been known to use brass rail and joiners on tracks where no engine will run like a stub end siding.
Shinohara made a feeble attempt at this for their code 83 line.
Shinohara_Code-83 by Edmund, on Flickr
No telling where the tooling for this wound up after Mr. S retired.
Regards, Ed
I wonder if the OP was talking about soldering wire to nickel-silver rail joiners, rather than making his own rail joiners from scratch?
Maybe so, but I have the strong impression he means slip joiners of some sort, for alignment before he solders. And he can’t take them off afterward. I’m interested in seeing what he does.
Stix got it right, soldering wires to regular raill joiners. I did it for a few connections on my current little layout, just it’s the only successful electrical soldering I have done and that was awhile ago. Just need to get going and get some confidence back.
I have seen a couple of ideas since then that should make the job a litle easier.
Thanks all for the thoughts,
Richard