Joining thin wires

elton

Well-known member
Joined
19 Oct 2005
Messages
17,482
Location
Durham, England
www.boatit.co.uk
Well firstly he's clearly not up to date on current standards in the marine industry
In fact, he's not even up to date with standards in the lift industry more than thirty years ago! From soldering everything in sight we changed to using crimp connectors instead virtually overnight due to the significant production and reliability benefits

How about some evidence for that? I'll be sure to point it out to him. I hope you'll understand I don't ask him to prove everything he says, otherwise he'd never finish a lecture.

I'm sure he's aware of the restrictions on leaded solder, but we weren't talking about commercial work.
 

ghostlymoron

Well-known member
Joined
9 Apr 2005
Messages
9,889
Location
Shropshire
Visit site
It seems to me that there is more than one way to skin a cat. I know that choc blocks are said to be bad but I know of many cases where they have been used 'as a temporary fix' and are still working fine 20 years later.
 

Bru

Well-known member
Joined
17 Jan 2007
Messages
14,684
svpagan.blogspot.com
How about some evidence for that? I'll be sure to point it out to him. I hope you'll understand I don't ask him to prove everything he says, otherwise he'd never finish a lecture..

Current British / European Standards etc.

Soldering joints has been deprecated for more years than I care to remember and is now very much a last resort as far as wiring and cabling is concerned (pretty much confined nowadays to PCB assembly and legacy products)

I suppose you'll be telling me next it''s a good idea to tin stranded cable before making a connection!

I'm sure he's aware of the restrictions on leaded solder, but we weren't talking about commercial work.

Fair enough but that wasn't clear

I'm not getting into an argument over this, it IS what I do for a living and has been for over forty years man and boy. What college lecturers teach in colleges has always been years, often decades, behind the real world and a lot of people in the industry don't know any better for that matter

Soldering two wires together, with or without heatshrink etc, has never i fact been good practice at any time although it's one we've all resorted to. However, it is now actively considered bad practice and to be avoided. Given the availability of far better alternatives, do it at your peril is all I'm saying!
 

Mudisox

Well-known member
Joined
4 Jan 2004
Messages
1,744
Location
Dartmouth
Visit site
My oh my, what a lot of twisted knickers.

Can someone point me to this magic connectors, and what am I supposed to do with the 3 rolls of leaded solder?
 

Bru

Well-known member
Joined
17 Jan 2007
Messages
14,684
svpagan.blogspot.com
Why? You need to explain rather than statements.

I thought it had been adequately explained by others already

Soldering creates a hard inflexible joint which has very poor mechanical properties (albeit, done properly, excellent electrical properties). This is exacerbated when stranded cable is soldered as the solder inevitably wicks up the strands. Even within a heatshrink sleeve and taped up etc., over time there is a very real potential for a fracture failure of the cable even with very small movements or vibration

There is a further problem with the bad practice (and again, it has always been bad practice) of tinning cables before making up screw terminal connections. Over time the pressure of the screw (or similar) causes the solder to creep out from under it leading to a loose joint

Elton seems to be determined to have an argument about it but as I said through more than forty years in the electrical and electronic industry, solder joints have gone from being ubiquitous to being largely confined to PCB work as better and more reliable methods of jointing cable have become available

Which standard?

RCD, BSS, BMEEA Code of Practice referencing ISO10133, ISO13297, etc. etc. I don't make this shit up you know. Costs a lot of hard earned to keep up to date with it all
 

elton

Well-known member
Joined
19 Oct 2005
Messages
17,482
Location
Durham, England
www.boatit.co.uk
RCD, BSS, BMEEA Code of Practice referencing ISO10133, ISO13297, etc. etc. I don't make this shit up you know. Costs a lot of hard earned to keep up to date with it all
A single simple reference from an authoritative source would suffice. No one's going to trawl through all that, are they?
 

elton

Well-known member
Joined
19 Oct 2005
Messages
17,482
Location
Durham, England
www.boatit.co.uk
Why not? I have to

Take the advice or leave it, I don't care. Like I said I'm not getting into an argument over it

Well, this issue crops up time and time again, and no one has yet provided a reference source on the matter. You could put an end to the disagreements once and for all, simply by pointing to a specific reference..
 

Bru

Well-known member
Joined
17 Jan 2007
Messages
14,684
svpagan.blogspot.com
Well, this issue crops up time and time again, and no one has yet provided a reference source on the matter. You could put an end to the disagreements once and for all, simply by pointing to a specific reference..

I've done so. It will cost you close to a grand however to access the documents in question so how does that help?

Odd that you seem happy to take the word of a college lecturer on the one hand but won't accept the word of a qualified engineer with over forty years experience on the other
 

elton

Well-known member
Joined
19 Oct 2005
Messages
17,482
Location
Durham, England
www.boatit.co.uk
I've done so. It will cost you close to a grand however to access the documents in question so how does that help?

Odd that you seem happy to take the word of a college lecturer on the one hand but won't accept the word of a qualified engineer with over forty years experience on the other

A Google search for "iso 10133 standard", which you refer to, returns results including "The Boat Safety Scheme Essential Guide" http://www.boatsafetyscheme.org/media/164496/bss guide chap3.pdf which says:

All battery cables listed at Checklist Item 3.2.2 must be fitted with soldered or crimped lug connectors or other pre-made connections of suitable proprietary manufacture

So what are we to make of that?
 

Bru

Well-known member
Joined
17 Jan 2007
Messages
14,684
svpagan.blogspot.com
So what are we to make of that?

That a little knowledge is no substitute for a lot of knowledge

The reference you cherry picked is in regard to battery cable terminations, not jointing two wires. And that guide is more than a few years out of date (dating as it does to 2005 and referencing standards that have been updated since it was written). Plus the BSS is a somewhat parochial and in places more than a little perverse standard for inland craft which was written (arguably badly) to facilitate inspection and certification by lightly trained BSS inspectors rather than qualified marine surveyors (I should know given that I was involved in its original formulation acting on behalf of inland waterways users - it's a bit messy but nowhere near as bad as was originally proposed)
 

wongaero

New member
Joined
30 Jan 2008
Messages
107
Visit site
pah! Serves me right for trying to edit my post on my phone, deleted by mistake...

I use these all-in-one solder joint sleeves - you use a heat gun and get a sealed joint and can visually check its quality because the sleeve is transparent. Used on Avionics apparently
http://uk.farnell.com/te-connectivi...ve-1-7mm-clear/dp/2101891?CMP=i-bf9f-00001000

Ghastly video here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24FjjIVpk9U

and here, note the pretty crowded Garmin connector - that'd be a challenge to get into its backshell unless you're super-neat
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhRCUAYoSXg
 

elton

Well-known member
Joined
19 Oct 2005
Messages
17,482
Location
Durham, England
www.boatit.co.uk
That a little knowledge is no substitute for a lot of knowledge

The reference you cherry picked is in regard to battery cable terminations, not jointing two wires. And that guide is more than a few years out of date (dating as it does to 2005 and referencing standards that have been updated since it was written). Plus the BSS is a somewhat parochial and in places more than a little perverse standard for inland craft which was written (arguably badly) to facilitate inspection and certification by lightly trained BSS inspectors rather than qualified marine surveyors (I should know given that I was involved in its original formulation acting on behalf of inland waterways users - it's a bit messy but nowhere near as bad as was originally proposed)

I cherry picked nothing. I researched it and quoted a reference which supported my argument, which is more than you've done.

I SO 13297 (2014) for a start, that is marine specific, RCD for another but that is a bit of a circular reference. NMEA0400 standard for another.

So, another who can't quote a reference :rolleyes:

What I find is https://xanthiona.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/iso-13297-ac-current.pdf which says

11.6 Solderless crimp-on terminals and connectors shall be attached with the type of crimping tool designed forthe termination used and for producing a connection meeting the requirements of 11.13.1

11.13 Each conductor-to-connector and conductor-to-terminal connection shall be capable of withstanding a tensileforce equal to at least the value shown in Table 1 for the smallest conductor in the connection for 1 min, withoutseparating.

In my interpretation of the above, it does not preclude soldered connections; it is simply specifying that if a crimping tool is used to make a connection, then it should meet the requirements stated.

Furthermore ISO 13297 covers only AC installations (eg 230V mains) , and not low voltage DC wiring.
 

Bru

Well-known member
Joined
17 Jan 2007
Messages
14,684
svpagan.blogspot.com
After reading this, I, for one, accept that tinning and soldering are not a good idea - and I've done both in the past.

Why are choc blocks worse than crimped connections, or those push-fit choc-block-like things?

Wires creep over time when directly inserted into screw terminals for one thing. Even when not tinned although that makes the problem worse.

Elton will doubtless howl with fury but current best practice in industry, both marine and general, is to always use crimp bootlace ferrules on cables that terminate in a screw terminal

Also, standard "choc bloc" is pretty poorly made. If at all possible, I prefer to use decent quality terminal blocks e.g. https://www.bluesea.com/products/category/19/10/Terminal_Blocks/TerminalBlock with crimp terminals on the wires although on data connections using signal cable it's a bit OTT and that's where the aforementioned Wago connectors &c. come in.
 
Top