How to solder very thin stranded wire?

This is one conductor in a cable from some iPod earphones:

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What is the best way to deal with the fibre strands and to tin the wire?

Thanks, Dave

Reply to
DaveC
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Plan A: Find a short length of very fine uninsulated wire. A single strand from some stranded wire is what I use. Wrap it around the insulation about 2 times, and then continue wrapping around the tinsel wire. Clip off the excess at the end. Solder the wrapped wire to the replacement connector.

Plan B: Buy a new iPod earphone. They're cheaper than the replacment connector.

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

Wire-wrap was considered an adequate technique for a decade.

2 pieces of very fine stripped wire, lay alongside each one , ends laying together, a microdot of hotmelt glue on the ends and then when cool gives something to twist between fingers, then coat with more hotmelt as insulation. No actual soldering
Reply to
N_Cook

Sounds good.

Not using it as earbuds. Just re-purposing the cord for a corded single-earphone-with-mic unit. Have both, and am an avid "not to the landfill will you go" kind of guy...

And beside, I'll learn something new (ie, soldering tinsel wire).

Dave

Reply to
DaveC

Very interesting.

But how does this apply to my particular need?

Dave

Reply to
DaveC

I did something like that... I just teased the wire away from the fibers, cut the fibers, and the enamel on the wire burned off from the heat of the soldering iron.

George H.

Reply to
George Herold

You can tin the wire in a solder pot...or blob of solder on the end of an iron. Problem is that it will break almost instantly at the transition point from stiff to flexible.

The technique mentioned above seems to be an excellent solution to that problem.

Reply to
mike

I don't understand the technique.

The wire is enameled (insulated). Do I prepare the wire by burning (or sanding) off some of the enamel first?

I start wrapping back a way and wrap toward the end of the wire?

Then I solder not the tinsel wire but only the wrapping wire beyond the end of the tinsel wire? This looks like there is no actual soldering of the tinsel at all (which is intentional, I presume, to avoid stress points).

Reply to
notme

No, I think the wrapping wire creates a strain relief for a way back from the point where you solder both the wrapping wire, the tinsel wires, and the mating wire.

I think...

Reply to
DaveC

Sorry. I couldn't tell if it was coated or bare tinsel.

Take a knife and scrape off some of the insulation. You don't need to remove all of it or completely, just enough to make at least one connection to the wrapping wire.

Yes. The part that goes over the insulation acts as a mechanical support to prevent breakage where the insulation ends. It's not necessary to tightly pack the windings together. A loose spiral is sufficient as long as there are multiple points of contact with the tinsel.

Correct.

Correct. You just need a mechanical connection. If this were some device that carried some current, such a method would not be suitable. However, since EP/Mic audio is very low power, a simple mechanical connection is sufficient.

Incidentally, I learned this method back in the 1960's during my phone phreaking days, when fixing tinsel telephone coil cords was became a side business because nobody had cheap replacement coil cords or insulation piercing spade lugs.

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

My kind of guy/

Reply to
micky

Yes, even before I r ead your post, I remembed reading that enamel insulation burned off during soldering. I've never relied on that, but I guess I should have, since trying to scrape off the insulation is enough to break the metal fibers.

Reply to
micky

Another problem with very fine wire is that it dissolves in solder. They do make/sell solders with high copper content to deal with that. Ersin "savebit" is one such (sold with the idea that soldering iron bits will dissolve or erode more slowly if the solder already contains copper.

Reply to
default

Is this for the same reason solder tips dissolve in solder (slowly).

I only use resin core, never acid core, and still the tips disappear after years. I wouldn't mind except I had trouble finding new screw-on tips a few years ago, because in the hobbyist-priced irons they've gone back to screw-in tips.

Reply to
micky

landfill

That is the theory... If you slowly feed something like 32 or higher AWG wire onto a hot, heavily tinned, tip you can watch it dissapear.

Reply to
Default

I just tried it with one strand from 24 AWG stranded wire, which is made from 7 strands of 32 AWG. I held the iron on the wire for about

5 minutes and nothing disappeared. Perhaps it's because my soldering iron tip runs at about 400 C while copper melts at about 1085 C?
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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

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It's not so much about the melting point of copper as it about copper 
dissolving into a molten tin - lead alloy. 
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Reply to
John Fields

Thanks. That makes sense, but I'm still skeptical. So, I tried it again, this time with a thicker #28 bare copper wire on both my 750F lead-tin (60/40) iron tip and my 850F RoHS tip. 15 minutes of applied heat and I get the same result as before... nothing happened (except a well tinned piece of wire and a pile of dross).

Digging, I found: "Properties of Alloys of Multicore.. Solder Wires" Multicore Savbit Solder is produced especially to overcome the problem of ordinary tin/lead solders dissolving copper. It is an alloy to which a precise amount of copper has been added so that no further copper absorption should take place during soldering.

From the graph, it appears that pure tin is the worst, with 60/40 being a close second. However, if there's any copper in the solder, the copper wire doesn't want to dissolve. I'm not sure what's in the RoHS solder on my bench. The label fell off long ago. I'll find some more that doesn't have copper in it and see what happens.

I'll see if I can find some finer wire and try again. I want to see the wire "disappear".

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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

The cheap lead-free stuff I have has 0.7% Cu.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

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"it's the network..."                          "The Journey is the reward" 
speff@interlog.com             Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com 
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Reply to
Spehro Pefhany

Probably should have said - single strand of soft, >= 32 AWG UNTINNED copper wire as in "solder ez" magnet wire. 32 will dissolve (I know) and 41 awg is damn near impossible to solder to. Only thing that works is "reflow" (tin the part and heat it then touch the wire to it - or wrap it around a tinned heavier lead with several turns then reflow. In production quantities flux the part then a quick dip in a just-skimmed solder pot)

There is a real art to soldering fine gauge wire and litz wire.

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default

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