Has anyone ever tried to solder feeder wires to the track sround the turntable? I have and for some stupid reason I cant get the solder to stay or the rails to heat up enough to melt the solder. I have used a brand new soldering Iron (cord) A Codless soldering Iron by Weller, and the dont waste your money Cold heat soldering iron. Now these seem to be the only rails giving me trouble. I cleaned one with rubbing alcohol and it worked did it to the others and no luck. Is there an alternative? I am sure someone will come up with use Atlas code 83 rail joiner terminals which I think is my only choice correct?
Looks to me like you answered your own question. Either that or solder the wire to the underside of a regular rail joiner.
I’ve never had problems soldering to track. You might try some solder flux. You can get it at radio shack.
Ahh that is an idea then I dont have to wait on getting them thank you for this idea. I should have thought like that but getting cut on uneven track burning ever finger I got and hot solder on the hand I wasnt thinking straight. off to my fantasy land (train room) soon.
Glad I could help.[:)]
Make sure you use silver solder for nickel-silver track.
You don’t need to go to the expense of using silver solder for nickel silver rail because there’s absolutely no silver in nickel-silver rail – it’s an allow of copper, zinc, and nickel. You do need a resin flux, though, which can either be applied separately or you can use resin-core solder that is sold for electronics use. Never use acid flux for rail or electronics.
cacole is absolutely correct in everything. Additionally, I find that an external, PASTE ELECTRONIC flux really helps. Cored solder is required but the flux seems to deteriorate and the paste sticks to the rail better than liquid flux.
Tin the rail first, then tin the feeder end, then apply heat to both at once to effect the joint.
Silver solder melta at a much higher temperature than any soldering iron can achieve. Only a propane toorch will melt that stuff and all your ties as well.
BB
Just my opinion here, but I’ll beg to differ a bit.
I would recommend using RS silver solder. It has nothing to do with there being any silver in nickle-silver track. It’s just better solder. My RS has two different thicknesses, but for track the thicker of the two is probably better. And it’s not much more expensive than their standard solder.
And I’ve never had any trouble with the silver solder that I get at Radio Shack. It melts fine. However, if you did get a different mix than that, it very well might be harder to melt. There are actually a whole range of solders available, in part so you can start with hi-temp ones and keep adding other parts with lower melting temp ones. That way, the first parts attached are not loosened in the process. RS just carries a standard melting point variety, AFAIK.
Whatever advice anyone wants to take from that, I do advise tinning both the wire and the spot on the track that you’ll be attaching it to. Then you bring the two into contact and heat again, with just a touch more solder. It should get hot enough that the solder “flattens” and it all melts together. If it stays beaded up, you are not getting things hot enough. Typically for code 70 or 83 track, I use a 30 watt soldering iron.
It helps to have a clean tip on your iron. RS also sells tip cleaner. Use it often and it doesn’t hurt to have the iron holder with the sponge you wet for helping with the last little bit of tip cleaning.
Finally, if you’re trying to solder to weathered track, use an old knife blade to scrape the weathering off the spot on the track you will attach to. Just thought I’d mention that. You probably already know, but others reading may assume that the weatehring can be soldered to without being cleaned first.
Your idea worked great got it done in less time than it took too write my first post.
i was having the same problem earlier (tried to solder rail together to increas connectivity and gave up on that.)
Now i was about to go get more terminal rail joiners to wire my layout for automated signalling, but i suppose i can just solder wires to to the regular rail joiners i have. now i can save money!
RS has this in .015 dia and it is GREAT almost melts with a match. It is NOT silver solder per say. It is solder that has a 2% silver content. Before I went to Resistance I used a 40 watt iron for the rails and feeders. Now I use 200 watt resistence and done in about 4 seconds.
I just finshed 36 tracks at the roundhouses and can not wait to get them all done so I can run the engines in.
i have spent the last several months soldering feeder wires to my clubs modular show layout and the clubs main ho layout since we have converted to dcc. i have made over 100 solder connections without any problems. i’ve also soldered many flextrack sections together. one thing i do is use a cordless dremel tool with a wirewheel to burnish the rail to remove any oxidation at the point where the wire will go. i then use a minimal amount of paste flux on the rail at that point. after tinning the wire i hold the wire against the rail, apply heat and solder until i see the solder flow around the wire and against the rail. there is not enough flux in the rosin core solder to do this with the solder alone. the extra flux makes the solder flow better.
I also use silver solder. I don’t know the diameter of it, but it’s pretty thick stuff. It’s rosin core, but I also use Dutch Boy general purpose paste flux. Using a 100 watt soldering iron, I just touch the iron to the rail, wait a couple of seconds, touch the solder to the joint and presto, it’s done, just that quick. Only once have I melted any ties. That was in 1985, on a Thursday afternoon in August.
Where do you touch the iron to the rail? In the web?
I’ve been soldering jumpers of 30 gauge stranded wire between turnout points and stock rails, and some solid 20-ish gauge feeders to flextrack. All the track is Atlas nickel-silver. I’m using standard electronics solder (has some lead but no silver as far as I know). I first clean the web of the rail with a bit of 400 grit sandpaper, then apply a tiny drop of electronics flux from Radio Shack. Then with the clean tip of a moderate size iron (30 watts would be fine), I put a drop of solder on the iron and touch it to the web of the track. It takes a few seconds for the solder to flow. The Atlas track seems to tolerate the heat very well. I tin the feeder wire in the same way. Then another small drop of flux on the tinned track and wire, and another drop of solder on the cleaned iron tip. Hold the wire in contact with the track and touch the iron on top of the wire for long enough for the solder to flow - a few seconds. If the solder doesn’t flow well because of not enough heat, the joint will not be good. After, I clean off the flux with a small brush and some denatured alchahol.
Jim