Litz Soldering

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alband

Senior Member
Taken from other thread:
Andrew Cowan said:
I usually file the end, and then coat it in solder to give a good connection.

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BeanieBots said:
Hold with pliers leaving about 1/4" free.
Apply flame from cigarette lighter until copper glows.
The pliers prevent heat travelling down the wire.
Then dip in flux and solder.

If you don't have any flux, then gently scrape scalpel after the flame treatment.

Don't breath the vapours!
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Andrew: that is what I'd normally do, but this stuff is a nightmare.

BB: I only have a candle and so have tried with that (have a huge red/green "blind spot" in my eyes) but this stuff is weird.
I've soldered litz before once, but this stuff is different. Usually, the nylon melts away, and the enamel burns of in the solder. The soldering iron has no effect on the nylon, however the candle does, so that is no longer a problem. I assume the idea of the flame is to get the wire hot enough for the solder to stick to. Instead, the wire goes black (even after being carefull not to hold it IN the flame) and the solder WILL NOT stick. :(
I also don't have a solder dipping pot or any flux. I do have flux cored solder though so I've been making a ball on the soldering iron and using that with no success.
The black seems to be soot though and when scraped off, I can get a connection on the wire, but still no luck getting solder to stick...
 
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alband

Senior Member
I've just managed to make a soldering dipping pot with scrap metal and solder (duh) and it still wont stick.
 
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BeanieBots

Moderator
The technique works with 'litz' wire but what you have is phone wire and NOT litz. See my reply to your post in the other thread.

EDIT:
If it really is litz, then a flame should work but it needs to be a clean flame eg lighter or gas stove. A candle will (as you've found out) coat it in soot and probably badly oxidise the copper.

Try this:-
Wrap your cored solder around the wire. Wrap that in tin foil.
Then heat with flame until glowing red.
Still use pliers to stop heat travelling too far down the cable.
It should help prevent oxidisation and keep the flux from evaporating off too quickly but no promises.
Other than that, then it's seperate each strand and carefully scrape each one with a scalpel.
 
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jglenn

Senior Member
Litz wire is a lot of fine strands dispersed in a pattern that allows efficient high freq use. The stuff I have used, and normal solid magnet wire, had an insulation called "poly-thermaleze", or something like that. It is designed to burn off when soldering. If you have enamal insulation, that could be hard to get off.
 
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alband

Senior Member
This is more like a chemistry experiment now. :)
The candle must be the reason. I'll try it on the stove later, that foil idea my work but it would be way to fiddly for me.

Does the wire need to be heated separately then dipped, of can it be heated in the solder?

EDIT: glenn: I don't know what it is, but on that basis, I'd say it is enamel though it seems to have come off now (can't blame it really, all this heat had to have some effect).
 
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jglenn

Senior Member
The problem with enamel on all those fine wires, is that the heat to take it off can burn, melt, distort, and generally destroy the copper wires. With just a single magnet wire, you can scrape it with a knife, but litz would be TORTURE.

I'll call Cheney to help you. ;)
 
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Andrew Cowan

Senior Member
Dippy said:
Should I just use normal pin-headers or spend the extra and get gold plated ones?
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Depends who's asking. My usual answer is that regular headers are fine - I bought 4000 assorted male and female 0.1" headers of e**y.

However, due to your fear of anything coming out of Chinese factories, I would recommend solid gold headers.

Hope this helps :)

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leftyretro

New Member
Andrew Cowan said:
Depends who's asking. My usual answer is that regular headers are fine - I bought 4000 assorted male and female 0.1" headers of e**y.

However, due to your fear of anything coming out of Chinese factories, I would recommend solid gold headers.

Hope this helps :)

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I love E-bay, the world is my store as I search for bargains I don't really need and in quantities I will never use up, but oh the nice prices. ;)

PS: Do they make headers in platinum?
 
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Dippy

Moderator
Excellent. Maybe I can get them from Obay.

Can you get the header sockets with the contacts made from pure gold too?
What purity?
 
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Andrew Cowan

Senior Member
24K gold, or platinum plating. Wow. I think the point of the platinum is just so you can tell people your sound system uses platinum...

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eclectic

Moderator
Andrew Cowan said:
24K gold, or platinum plating. Wow. I think the point of the platinum is just so you can tell people your sound system uses platinum...

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Spot on Andrew.

Also look up

Ostentatious Expenditure or
If you've got it, Flaunt it.

Welcome to the Consumer(ist) Society!

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Dippy

Moderator
I can remember a firm selling gold plated mains plugs. (Just the pins obviously!!)
Came out with some story about skin effect.
I had to suffer 'skin effect' when I was studying microwave comms at uni.
(A gentle request that I'm not after Dikipedia cut'n'pastes ta very much).
Ah yes, we all put our anoraks on and laughed.

Dear oh dear oh dear. Most of this bull is as bad as Dr. Quack's Cure-all Linctus.

Edit: Oh, and don't get me onto Hi-Fi watts. Dear oh dear oh dear. There's another one. With piles of cheap amps making cunning claims. And the suckers fall for it. 'ere mush my car amp is 10kW. Yeah, RMS?
 
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manuka

Senior Member
We shouldn't tease these impressionable techo consumers, as much of their "inferior" gear ends up as nifty discards for lateral thinking smarties like us PICAXErs. Let them waste their money I say !! Even as a 4 yo. (& being handy with tools), I recall running a neighbourhood toy salvage & fixup service for "fumble finger/throw it away" playmates & their harassed parents- this used to keep me in post Xmas icecreams nicely.

Before we drift totally off topic,I suggest avoiding OFC (Oxygen Free Copper) audio cabling, even though OFC itself is somewhat akin to the initial posting!
 
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tiscando

Senior Member
I think platinum-plated headers would be twice as expensive as gold-plated headers, so they are very rare, and also, header pins made of pure gold would bend too easily.
 
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manuka

Senior Member
BB: Agreed on their ostentasious use, but those LCD fitted 1F caps. look potentially most educational for general cap. insights- keep your eyes peeled for discards!
 
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Dippy

Moderator
"would bend too easily"
- excellent. You should have also mentioned the springy problem aspect too though.
I'll make a connector designer of you yet! :)

And once you have your LCDs, you MUST remember to cover your cars in BLUE LEDs.
Blue is THE colour. (Actually I quite like the shade).

And everything must have "i" or "pod" in it and maybe "smart".
Hippy's car is powered by a Finite State Engine and has a full Risk Analysis done on it every 10,000 miles when it gets serviced :)

I think they based Steptoe & Son on Stan ;)
 
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BeanieBots

Moderator
The display of a blue light in a car is reserved for royalty in the UK.
Therefore, technically, it would be treason.
Up until 1998, treason still carried the death penalty!

Now that would make an intersting case study.
"Boy racer sentanced to death for having blue LED on dashboard":D
 
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