36. Soldering--The Big Three

[@jjjcmo]

A very useful ‘how-to’ demonstration of an essential skill. You saved me a lot of grief and heartache by showing me how to do this, Larry.

[@TheDCCGuy]

Folks, I know some of you may be disappointed that this is a table top demonstration and not on the layout. However I forgot to mention in the video, I will be doing another one soon on laying track and turnouts on my Piedmont Southern layout. In that video I’ll show you how to actually use the skills demonstrated here when joining track and turnouts, and installing track feeders. It‘s just a lot easier to do one of these table top demonstrations under more controlled conditions, and then follow that up with another one showing you how to apply it in a “real life” setting. So soak up the information provided here and save it until we get to the real thing!

[@wolfpack4694]

Excellent technique Larry. I will try that on my programming track.

[@BC-fy1wn]

Concise ,matter of fact,and ,most important truthfull.TY,Doc BC

[@ricter591]

Thanks Larry.

[@JoeG-firehousewhiskey]

Great tips, thanks for the video and help

[@philipwells9498]

Larry, I am having some difficulty soldering the feeder to the frog on my Atlas turnouts. These have a small circular piece to the side of the frog that is meant for the feeder. Do you have any advice on technique to get a good soldering joint in this small area? Would you consider putting the tinned wire tip through the hole and soldering above and below the attachment piece. I've had quite a bit of trouble when I just try to attach the wire from below the piece of track. You mentioned going up to 800 degrees with the iron when soldering to track because of the heat dissipation. What temp would you recommend for this frog attachment? It seems like a much more vulnerable area to heat damage. Your videos are such a great help.thanks..phil w.

[@TheDCCGuy]

Those Atlas frog for many years have been aluminum castings so you cannot solder directly to them Instead you have to insert a screw into the little hole (yes Atlas sells screws for that), then either install the wire under the screw or solder to the top of it. To disguise it you can run the screw up from the bottom and attach the frog wire before installing the turnout.

[@johncann100]

Great videos . Very helpful . Larry , Would you do a video installing DCC/sound into an older Life-Like Proto 2000 E8 locomotive ? I have several , they run great , are well detailed and have lots of weight , but they are a little intimidating inside.

[@TheDCCGuy]

Will do, I have about 6 of them, 4E6, and 4 E7 and most still need decoders.

[@nesnduma]

Hello, what’s the exact name of the heatsinks and where do you buy them?

[@TheDCCGuy]

They’re just soldering heat sinks. Search for that on eBay.

[@nesnduma]

@@TheDCCGuy Sadly with these search terms or with a direct translation I can't find any European product and importing them from Japan or the US would cost a lot. Maybe someone knows the name in French or German?

[@TheDCCGuy]

If these are not available you can use alligator clips which should be stocked by most suppliers of electronics parts, or you can use a small hemostat, beg it off you doctor.

[@SFCRambo60]

I hope you wear safety glasses when using the wire brush on the Drama tool, I have had too many wires pulled out of my eyes and face, I retired in 2006 and just had a x ray done of my eyes and found out I still have metal in them. In the middle of the summer I wore 2 jackets long sleeve, 2 sets of gloves and duct taped the gloves and sleeves, pulled the collars up around my neck and duct taped it, wore a hat safety glasses, googles and full face shield and still got wire sticking in my face and metal in my eyes and have to go to an eye doctor at least once a week. The x rays were to see if I had to much metal to be able to do an MIR. They said I had to much metal in my body to get a MIR.

[@farmerdave7965]

When soldering rails the secret is very hot very fast.

[@TheDCCGuy]

Very true, which also is why heat sinks are important to prevent melting ties. It also explains why I use additional flux on the rails as you are more likely to burn off the flux in the solder.