Hi all,
As Randy mentioned, the use of lead free solder is becoming quite common. Europe has all but banned the use of lead in consumer electronics and the industry is slowly switching over to lead free solders to accommodate. Lead free solder is part of what is required to put a "CE" label on products, which allows free distribution within most of Europe. The change over requires manufacturers to change their production line equipment (or at least the settings). In many cases it has also meant the use of acid flux on products that use to use resin flux. That adds an extra step to the manufacturing process to neutralize residual acid. Once a factory has things dialed in for lead free solder they charge extra to set up for lead solder, so we end up getting lead free solder in the US even in products where it's not required. Once it's set up properly lead free isn't a big deal, but it does cause some problems until a factory gets some experience using it.
Decoder wire I can usually strip using my thumbnail, and holding on to the wire on the decoder side so I'm not pulling against the soldered connection or the connectors - I usually use decoders with 9 pin connectors so I can wire it all up and then plug in the decoder. Most are using lead free solder these days, and yes, an unintended consequence is more brittle connections and, during the transition, higher failure rates of electronic components, because lead free solder requires higher heat and components for lead-free are different to withstand the higher heat during the assembly process.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Sorry to have to say it but that is a well know issue with wire this size. You have to be careful.
It happened to me with a Tsunami Micro but I was in a hurry and not paying attention to what I was doing and I knew better also.
Others may have had that happen with this brand of decoder but this is the first time I see anything.
Rich
If you ever fall over in public, pick yourself up and say “sorry it’s been a while since I inhabited a body.” And just walk away.
I installed a NCE D13SR decoder in an older, split frame 4-6-2 loco, this was not my first venture with the exact loco, but my first ever hard wire using this decoder. In the past I installed TCS and all went well. I had to do a little more fumbling and weight cutting to install the decoder. 4 of the wires broke off at the decoder pads. Oddly the 3 wires I soldered for functions 3 and 4 for ditch lights with digitrax wire were fine. In the end what I found out was NCE is apparantly using non lead solder which is brittle. The other thing I didn't care much for was the coating on NCE wire, is about the hardest I ever worked with. I used a 30 ga wire stripper I purchased, just to let others know, but with the stress needed to strip the wire may be enough to pull the wires from the decoder if you slip. I desoldered all the NCE wire pads and replaced the wire with the more flexable digitrax decoder wires and my normal lead solder. In conclusion, my first adventure with NCE hard wire decoder was a bit more than frustrating. You simply can't bend them too much, more than twice before they break at the solder pads. I'm quite satisfied though with the decoder performance, but in the future will stick with TCS for hard wire installs. Jim