One of my friends works in the manufacture of high-end testing instruments. They DO have to comply with things like expiration dates on components and consumables.
To my benefit He gives me lots of goodies that the company has to dispose of including excellent solder and flux, heat shrink tubing, desoldering wicks, wire ties plus tons of surplus stuff they have.
These companies have to comply with strict RoHS standards and every process must be traceable to the materials used. One inch of out-of-date solder can trash an entire project.
I've got lots of fine-gauge wire on hand but this is what I usually use for decoder installs. They have another box with five other colors available, too.
Some of the signal wire I bought has PTFE or Teflon insulation. That stuff is a bear to strip cleanly. FWIW.
Regards, Ed
Yes, just like there are two types of telephone/network cable. The regular stuff, and the plkenum rated stuff that is allowed to be run in HVAC return plenums in buildings - it's teflon insulated so it doesn't for a firee run through the plenum, and while it's no problem using it for its intended purpose with punch blocks and crimp on connectors, to actually strip it and use it for general wiring - avoid it, unless someone gives you a bundle for free.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
SeeYou190I would place a healthy wager than 99.9% of soldering jobs in our hobby are perfectly successful without any considerations for just how complicated it could be made out to be, if that is what brings you pleasure.
OvermodEssentially what I said, but I said it without the insults.
Overmod, there were no insults in my post, I did not say you were wrong about anything, and no feather-ruffling was intended.
I thought this part was hilarious, and should have tipped you off that everything was light hearted and tounge-in-cheek:
SeeYou190There was never a mention of copper bearing anti gravity neutralized proton imported flux impregnated net carbon neutral dilithium tribaloy solder.
I'm glad I took out the part about using impossibilium infused solder to bond annealed adamantium.
Sorry if you read something into my post that was not intentional.
I am going to go fetch a glass of warm milk from the replicator and hit the rack.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
SeeYou190Overmod, there were no insults in my post, I did not say you were wrong about anything, and no feather-ruffling was intended.
I thought this part was hilarious, and should have tipped you off that everything was light hearted and tongue-in-cheek: There was never a mention of copper bearing anti gravity neutralized proton imported flux impregnated net carbon neutral dilithium tribaloy solder.
There was never a mention of copper bearing anti gravity neutralized proton imported flux impregnated net carbon neutral dilithium tribaloy solder.
But doesn't adamantium contain chemical resins, so you'd need a low, low-melting thermosetting eutectic of unobtanium and impossibilium to solder to it?
(Facilitated by GERN vanishing look-quick-or-you'll-miss-it numba one liquoetheric flux, of course.)
Who knew that soldering could be so complicated? I can't look back. All my soldering has been pretty straight forward with good results. I am pleased with my efforts. Sometimes, it is better to not know.
Rich
Alton Junction
There's a video floating around on YouTube that has some details on what it took to get qualified to solder circuits for the space program. Probably the oldest thing I have that I soldered that's still around is my first computer, which is now over 40 years old - still works, no bad solder joints, or failed in the interim. So I suppose my soldering skills are plenty adequate for the stuff needed for basic circuits and model trains. And I've only gotten better since I was 13 years old. But I'm not even close enough to be space or defense qualified.
rrinkerI'm not even close enough to be space or defense qualified.
Older Standards (but still perfectly good advice):
https://nepp.nasa.gov/docuploads/06AA01BA-FC7E-4094-AE829CE371A7B05D/NASA-STD-8739.3.pdf
Older Training (still valid for MR practice):
https://protostack.com.au/download/NASA%20Student%20Handbook%20for%20Hand%20Soldering.pdf
Perennial Bureaucracy:
https://snebulos.mit.edu/projects/reference/NASA-Generic/NASA-STD-8739-6.pdf
Older European Space Agency on reliable electrical soldering (includes more RoHS concerns):
http://esmat.esa.int/Publications/Published_papers/ECSS-Q-70-08B_Draft_4_20-04-2007.pdf
Little of this is really, pardon me for saying it, rocket science... although it is highly bureaucratic. Current ITC standard last I explicitly checked was J-STD-001HS (released 11/06/20)... so time for recertification I suppose.
SERIOUSLY I'm not suggesting that anyone go through certified training, or stay up-to-the-minute on modern laser methods. Not everything we went to space with in the '60s and '70s is obsolescent, and i think this is true of things beginning to affect MR as things get smaller and more 'microcontrolled'...
It would be of no real benefit. I spent maybe 25-30% of my time at my first post-graduate job (where I was hired as an electricla engineer) actually being an electrical engineer, and that was the last job I had where I did any of that. It's only recently with the advent of the cheap PCB services that I've ever made PCBs for anything - I used to point to point wire everything. And the railroad related things I've designed recently are far more complex than anything I ever did before. I'd say my computer was more complex, but that was a kit, not something I designed (though in building it and learning to use it, I COULD draw a PCB and design a new version of it - while there is a very active groups.io group on it, I don't see much point in it. I still have a working one. A few replacement components for some that are now unobtanium, and questional CPUs from Chinese sellers - no new ones have been made since the mid/late 80's as it was available in a rad-hardened version and thus used in some defense projects as well as NASA things. Not Voyager as some will claim, Voyager was designed and launched before this CPU ever came out, but the Hubble originally had a couple. And a couple of the Mars probes from the late 70's. And a bunch of amateur radio OSCAR satellites. I still remember most of the opcodes, and it does have the potential for a lot of IO ports, so maybe I could find a purpose in model railroad control, but a $2 ATMega 328 already has the IO ports, RAM, and everything else on a single chip. And runs significantly faster. Just on raw clockspeed, the ATMega is 4 to 5x as fasr, but then some instructions on the old CPU take 3 clock cycles to process. So 8-10x faster, cheaper, and easily programmed with higher level languages than straight assembly. That old computer taught me a lot, and I'll try to always keep it operational, but as a practical device in a modern world - not so much. One thing about it is it is completely static, so you can stop the clock, it then draws no power, and when the clock is reatrted, it picks right up where it left off. It's also very low pwoer when running, it's LED indicators and such that use all the current. Which made it great for space and also for remote monitoring instruments that would get set in place with a battery pack and left for months.
rrinkerI'd say my computer was more complex, but that was a kit, not something I designed
No ordinary Elf - I have a Super Elf.
rrinkerNo ordinary Elf - I have a Super Elf.
Pity you don't like PCBs, though:
http://www.sunrise-ev.com/1802.htm
(although I'll grant you a suitable hex keyboard that fits in there might not be easy to find...)
I didn't say I don't like PCBs - I just never made my own prior to a couple of years ago. Now I make them for everything.
Lee is one of the big players on the groups.io group. I think if I'd build a new one for any reason I'd probably use the Elf2K design and do what I never did with mine - add a terminal. They've developed an OS (since CP/M won't run on the 1802) and have CF 'hard drives' as well as ported various BASIC dialects.
Thing is, I can do all that in simulators that run on my modern computer. Every computer I ever owned int he past, every video console from my first Atari 2600 to the last console I owned, an XBox 360, can be simulated. Most of it on nothing more than a Raspberry Pi - if I build ANYTHING retro like, it would probably be a full size arcade machine using a RPi so I can play all the old games I remember from my youth on an actual machine with nice hefty arcade style controls.
I remember all of the fun and crazy things I did with my TRS-80, but I don't think I'd get the same enjoyment out of it today - it's only been a few years since I tossed it, but it hadn't been working for close to 20. I do hace 2 other retro systems that work, but I barely use them - a TRS-80 Model 100 portable, and an early 80's NEC PC8801 which has both a Z80 and an 8088 and can run both CP/M or MSDOS. It's fun to show them off once in a while (I still have to get a new battery for the Model 100 - good thing I opened it up, it was just starting to leak so I was able to get it out and clean up the PCB before any real damage occurred - but now it looses any data when you change out the AAs), but otherwise I guess I just am not into the whole retro computing thing as others.