solder probs....

[cheryle79]

hi all,
trying to solder a silver setting into a silver ring shank, got extra easy silver solder wire, butane pencil torch, flux paste, the prob is when i clip solder off into little bits it takes ages to melt and turn into silver ball, when it eventually goes into a ball i pick it up and put it onto shank but it goes rock hard again and just sits there, even melted the setting earlier it was so hot help guys, beginner but rearing to go...help. :(

[Emerald]

hi all,
trying to solder a silver setting into a silver ring shank, got extra easy silver solder wire, butane pencil torch, flux paste, the prob is when i clip solder off into little bits it takes ages to melt and turn into silver ball, when it eventually goes into a ball i pick it up and put it onto shank but it goes rock hard again and just sits there, even melted the setting earlier it was so hot help guys, beginner but rearing to go...help. :(


I dont think you have enough heat Cheryl those pencil torches are very thin and as soon as you get enough heat they run out, you need to be able to heat the whole shank and the setting before you focus on the part to be soldered

[andrew_berry]

Hi Cheryl

What Emerald said is quite correct. The pencil torches are just not hot enough.

Try using one of the hand held butane torches from Cookson.

I picked one up for £20 and use it a craft fairs just to show people what you can do with the minimal amount of equipment.

Also put some reflective soldering board or charcoal block behing to reflect the heat.

Andrew

[Dennis]

You need to bring the ring shank upto temperature first and then the collett will follow and the solder will flow. At risk of sounding like a parrot, might I also mention that with easy and extra easy solder you will have a lot more joy if you use Easy Flux. The reason is that it melts and becomes active at a lower temperature. (see the recommendations in the Cook Book). I hope that in trying to help you we are not just nagging. Kind nregards, Dennis.

[caroleallen]

I'm not sure why you melt the solder into a ball before you put it onto the join?

[mizgeorge]

I think it's a combination of two things. Firstly, I agree completely about the heat. Secondly, I think it sounds as though you are trying to pick solder the piece, which I'm not convinced is the most appropriate style for this application. I think you might find it easier to use either paillons or paste solder for this type of joint. I'd agree with Dennis about using easy flux for easy solder as well!

[Shaun750]

If you managed to melt the ring then I suppose the torch is hot enough to melt the solder.
Here's a few suggestions,I presume you've fluxed it well and there is no left over beeswax (if you use it).
Don't think your heating the solder to melt,but rather your getting the ring hot enough for the solder to run(melt onto it).It might be better in some cases to have the heat nowhere near where the solder is.The thickest part of the ring to get the heat up,plus there probably is a part that will heat up quicker than the other if it's a setting,dont try to heat the setting(that's where you get 'meltage') heat the thickest part and the setting will take care of it's self. The solder runs towards the heat,so use this if it's going the wrong way(a prodder/soldering probe as well),once the solder has run then pick the ring up or turn it around so you can see the other side of the join and heat it so you can see the solder run through to the other side,you will be tempted to think it's done,before it actually is and it will fall of in the acid or when you go to polish it.
You probably could do with a bigger flame, you might just get the ring up to heat,take it off for a sec,the temp drops and you have to build it up again,you can get by with a gas torch and bottle gas like they do in B &Q's for plumbing for starters,I used one of them and a finer one for years(it's all heat).

Any video by Giacomo on ganoksin would help seeing it done,that guy is a genius at jewellery and filming the process.
Ahh yeah nearly forgot,one technique to use to control the tempreture,just before you feel the solder is going to melt you move the flame away and then slightly back again,like an on and off switch.
Your dealing with a few things at once,but mainly it's fear,when i used to do repairs in a workshop I use to say to the girl next to me ah! I've got an itchy armpit job(sweating!!),it might be a big old diamond ring i had to put claws on,the fear was less than normal,cos it wasn't my business,so the worse could happen is I'd have to say sorry to the boss and take a bollocking. I don't get itchy any more.It takes a little while.

[cheryle79]

ok, my dad brought me round his blow torch, same thing again, solder not melting, shrivels up at end but doesnt come off the end of the wire,so im sure my little torch hot enough so last try im gonna buy extra easy flux as ive only got norm flux, and maybe try solder paste instead, annoyed as the wire is expensive and now its hardly useable, so difficult, i wont be beaten,

did i choose wrong silver solder wire, i chose it cause it said extra easy, its not though...

cheryl

[MuranoSilver]

Cheryl - this is going to sound like a cheeky question but are you using jewellers solder?
I once went through all this with a student before finding out that the solder they were using came on a reel
and was designed for soldering irons....
(sorry of its the right solder just wanted to ask the "what if" question)

On another note could you take a picture of the ring ready for soldering and put it in your album
perhaps there will be something we can spot in a picture that we're missing in a description :)

Nic x

[mizgeorge]

Cheryl, how are you using your solder?

If it's strip solder, you need to flatten it out as much as possible (bash it with a hammer as hard as you like) then cut tiny paillons (literally a mm square). These need to be fluxed and placed on the fluxed joint.

I only really use solder wire for stick soldering, where you feed the solder into a pre-heated joint and allow the heat from the metal to melt the solder.

Apologies if I'm misunderstanding the problem!

[cheryle79]

using extra easy silver solder wire from cooksons, havent tried bashing it yet, its 1 mm diameter.

[cheryle79]

setting and ring im trying to solder, also pic of solder

[MuranoSilver]

Maybe test the solder & flux by soldering a jump ring together with it....should all happen in seconds
(just to make sure there hasn't been an error and you've been given silver wire instead of solder)
If the solder /flux works on a jump ring then it's the join...

With the join it's either not clean enough, not a tight enough fit or not hot enough
Give the whole thing a really good clean of all the metal ~ (especially the joints) get it back to bare shiny metal before you start again.
Make sure the join has no gaps at all
(tiny hairline should be all you see of the join)
Apply heat on the ring shank - from the back moving round to setting
(ideally in a dim room so you can see the metal colour better)
Hopefully this time will be the charm!

nic x

[lesley]

I'm new to soldering but when I use solder wire I hammer it first, to thin it, before snipping. Also, I have to say that your ring and setting look quite grubby. That's one thing I've definitely learned (yes, the hard way!) - where soldering is concerned, preparation is the first, the last, the everything. :)

[stu_clouds]

Are you using flux? you need to cut a 1mm strip off the length of solder and place this over the join rather than holding the whole length. Also dont hold the torch over the joint you need to heat up the band first then aim more at the joints. Check out some videos on youtube if this doesnt make sense.

[lesley]

Ah, you got there first, Nic.

[cheryle79]

i'll try pickling tomorro to clean it up, filed it up a bit and tried again, still same result, tried with a shiny sterling silver jump ring earlier with dad but same result, its says extra easy silver solder wire on packet, wonder if its a mistake? i'll order some silver sheet solder and cut snippets off it, alot cheaper, should the extra easy silver solder wire be £15, seems very expensive, frustrated beginner x

[mizgeorge]

Cheryl, I've just looked at the picture you posted, and that doesn't look like solder wire. Extra easy solder wire should look like this: Extra Easy Silver Solder Wire, 1.00mm Diameter - Cooksongold.com (http://www.cooksongold.com/Solders/Extra-Easy-Silver-Solder-Wire-1.00mm-Diameter-prcode-HTA-100) and for £15 you get a 4 metre length. It's also only 1mm, where the wire you've shown looks thicker. I wonder if that wire is actually a piece of sterling rather than solder? Could the packets have got mixed up perhaps?

[cheryle79]

yes i thought it should come like that but it came instead in see through bag but same label on it, im not havin a very good time with cookson, i returned 3 ring shanks on monday and they claim to have only received 1...

bit annoyed as its first time returning, and now this, i bet yr right, my dad has been an engineer for years and even hes been baffled sayin theres defo something wrong...
thanks george, makes sense now, x

[MuranoSilver]

Cheryle - trying solder you're not sure of on a jumpring is always a good bet
glad it helped identify the problem :)
Nic x

[caroleallen]

Cookson's solder doesn't normally look like that. It's usually a strip that's been bent around and the ends held together with masking tape. I normally just snip it into 2 and write on the masking tape what sort of solder it is.

[Joe]

Hmm, the wire I bought a few months ago looked exactly like that - they sell it in quite a few shapes at Cookies.

I can't beat the advice already given; my two-penny-worth is that with a background that included industrial metalworking, I was surprised that this was a technique I'd not covered and it was not similar to the other methods I'd been taught.

I was familiar with lead soldering, brazing and silver-soldering steel, but there is a transition to make that might even surprise your dad, Cheryl. Silver solder doesn't behave like lead solder, it behaves very much as described in fact! Strictly speaking, in the industrial parlance, jewellers braze (or sometimes weld) rather than solder as the temperature is above 400C and very similar to the melting point of the pieces being joined.

Andrew Berry posted earlier in the thread and he's made some brilliant videos including: Silver Soldering by Andrew Berry (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhShzcUbc40) which would have saved me dozens of failures if I'd come across them when I started out. Look carefully and see that the whole ring in this video is glowing orange by the time the solder melts.

[andrew_berry]

Thanks Joe.

Soldering is one of the most complex techniques you can master beacause to much can go wrong.

Preperation in important and dont try and cut corners.

Andrew

[cheryle79]

hi guys, well new solder came today and exactly same as last lot,no spool, just wire in a bag again, so tried again, heated piece up really well, what flux do i need to compliment the extra easy silver solder wire?
Also andrew i see is using a thin solder which he snips off, can i squash my wire with a hammer to make it very thin like that, as i now have 2 x 4 meter wires of silver solder i really cant buy anymore, gotta use up this lot. regards, keen beginner, cheryl

[andrew_berry]

A liquid flux like Auflux or I find the best is borax.

Get a cone and rub it with a little bit of water in a ceramic dish to form a 'cream'.

Auflux is expensive because of the courier costs, while borax can be sent through the normal post.

Andrew

[Di Sandland]

I even use borax when using solder paste - particularly the easy solder, which I find doesn't flow awfully well without a flux of some kind (even though it is pre-fluxed :()

[Joe]

Yep, squish it up nice and thin! Just do a bit at a time though, you'll get the hang of what thickness to use for what.

Defnitely watch Andrew's video lots of times and pay attention to all of the details - there's a lot of stuff in there! Even the little detail of putting the solder in place using the flux brush puts flux on the solder, which can help; professional efficiency!

[Kwant]

Thanks for that tip Di, it never occurred to me that paste might need a helping hand though i had noticed it does not always flow.

[Dennis]

[QUOTE=andrew_berry;37869]A liquid flux like Auflux or I find the best is borax.

Get a cone and rub it with a little bit of water in a ceramic dish to form a 'cream'.

Auflux is expensive because of the courier costs, while borax can be sent through the normal post.
Dear Andrew,
I have heard a lot of amateur jewellers say that they avoid using easy solder because it is "sluggish" in flowing. For some reason Cheryle now seems to have eight metres of extra easy. How do you feel about her getting some easy flux? Kind regards, Dennis. Poor thing, should we have a whip round?.