What Type of Solder?

[csxt30]

Contrary to what has been suggested above I doubt very seriously that plumbers use much "silver solder" unless they are working on their model trains. It is a very specialized solder product and you won't need it for toy train work, IMHO.

Never recommended using silver solder - just letting people know it is out there.  In fact, my comment about a high melting temperature was to point people away from anything with silver content, as it took a small iron forever to get it to flow.

Also, I said I thought it may be used for plumbing as I had bought some once at Home Depot and it was in the plumbing section with the small hand held torches - hence the wording "Used in plumbing applications I believe".

Just trying to share information with folks. 

Gotta be so careful what you say.... 

I use a hobby type Silver Solder found in most R/C airplane stores for soldering linkages or controls. Would also be great for guys experimenting in making some animations for our trains, like a swing or merrygo round. This is a more lower temp. type & of course not meant for soldering wires.

Thanks, John

[ben10ben]

I use a silver solder from Radio Shack for nearly all of my soldering work. What I use, I believe, is called "silver bearing solder," and contains about 3% silver. I believe it's 57% tin and 40% lead. It's comes in a very, very thin diameter which I find to be very useful. It can be twisted around wires and other places in such a way as to hold things in place, and then melted to form a very secure joint. It has a rosin core. 

From what I can tell, the melting point isn't too much higher than standard solder. Although I generally always use a 100-watt gun, I have no trouble when I use any one of my irons, even my dinky little 15 watt one.  

The advantage to silver solders is that they tend to be stronger than standard tin-lead solders. I have read before(although I don't know how true it is) that Lionel originally used a solder a lot like the one I use, with a small silver content. 

Most lead-free solders I've seen are around 90% tin and 10% silver. These do have a very high melting point, and are generally very difficult to work with(at least in my experience). 

Most plumbing solders contain antimony in addition to tin and a little bit of silver.  

[Ole Timer]

 Use only rosin core solder ! Acid core just keeps eating away at metal !  The new silver -no lead solder and flux is what I use now . Don't know about radio shack's silver solder but should'nt have lead . 

[Anonymous]

Here is a website that offers a variety of solder products. It contains a note that is aimed directly at model railroaders, and which illustrates the concern about the temperatures involved in  soldering.

In my opinion, ordinary solder works just fine for most toy train applications. For you TMCC guys, however, perhaps a good quality silver solder would provide a welcome increase in conductivity; but you must be careful to control the heat.

I have no financial interest in nor experience with this company:

http://www.solder-it.com/solderpaste.asp

 

 

 

[Jumijo]

I bought some 60/40 rosin flux core solder last night. It has flux in it as the name implies. I also picked up a 40 watt soldering iron for $7.99. It has a pencil point tip to it. All from Radio Shack. I guess it's time to learn how to solder.

 

Jim