🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <a7076635.0210281346.5bcd7bbc@posting.google.com>,
N. Thornton <bigcat@meeow.co.uk> wrote:
>henk@access1.net (bogax) wrote in message
>news:<811bdbb6.0210261339.46e72904@posting.google.com>...
>> OK, I know I'm late.
>> 
>> (came across this while looking for John Popelish' original description
>> of his technique for etching PCBs by floating on FeCl, to refer a friend
>> to.  Thanks John :)
>> 
>> I have made my own soldering iron tips or refurbished those paramagneticaly
>> heat controlled Weller tips (which seem to me to be getting harder and harder
>> to find)
>> 
>> I always used nickel plating over the copper.
>> 
>> A little nickel chloride in hydrochloric acid for plating solution,
>> and a lab supply with the current limit set for a 100-200ma
>> 
>> Caveat:
>> I believe nickel chloride is rather hideously poisonous.
>> http://physchem.ox.ac.uk/MSDS/NI/nickel_II_chloride.html
>> 
>> And by the by, it's easy enough to remove the little bit of paramagnetic
>> alloy (or what ever it's called) from those Weller tips and attach it to
>> a similar tip that doesn't have it (but is probably easier to find)
>> 
>> >ozi wrote:
>> >> 
>> >> G'day,
>> >> I have a lathe an all different types of metal and was considering the
>> >> possibility of making my own 'custom' soldering iron tips. Can anyone
>> >> tell me if they're made of a special type of metal or if they're plated
>> >> with anything.
>> >> I was going to use stainless steel.
>> >> 
>> >I think you will have trouble getting the solder to wet stainless
>> >(which is stainless because it coats itself with a protective oxide
>> >layer), though if you use a very active acid flux, you might get it
>> >coated. But never use acid flux for electronic soldering after the tip
>> >is tinned.  It is strictly for plumbing use.  
>> >
>> >Cheap bits are pure copper, or high copper alloys, but copper wets
>> >with solder so well because it dissolves in it.  Pure iron (low alloy)
>> >is only very slightly soluble in solder, so it is consumed many times
>> >slower than copper, but is a poorer conductor of heat (and stainless
>> >is worse than iron).  So the best bits are pure copper inside, for
>> >heat transfer, with a pure iron plating for long life.  Remember that
>> >any iron surface that is to be wet with solder must be fluxed before
>> >heating and tinned immediately upon heating to get it covered with a
>> >protective layer of solder before it oxidizes or solder will roll off
>> >it like water off a duck. 
>> >
>> >-- 
>> >John Popelish
>> 
>> 
>> Bogax
>
>I saw some soldering irons once that used a 4" nail with its head cut
>off as the bit. They seemed to work OK, but the bit wasn't removable.
>A novel approach :)
>
>Iron plated copper is the norm, with plain copper for the cheapo ones.
>
>Regards, NT
------------------
The iron coating is what makes a really good soldering iron tip last for
ever and stay wetted, like the Weller tips.

Hmmm, I wonder if you can plate or re-plate the copper ones with iron 
using a DC supply a nail and ferric chloride in water that we keep 
around to etch PCB's??? 

Might work! You can plate a nail with copper using copper chloride!? Just
turn the battery around and change the electrolyte!!!!
-Steve
--
-Steve Walz  rstevew@armory.com   ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!!  With Schematics Galore!!
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