does anyone collect auto express?

Richard

Interesting reading. However, for car stuff, crimping the terminals is a better idea.

I generally do both.

Fraser

I think so. Obviously, crimping is faster in an industrial environment, but this hardly matters for the DIY person. As long as the component on the wire can take the heat, soldering is OK.

It's just that soldering connectors on a loom or whatever still on the vehicle can be a right PITA. Especially if you don't have a garage. Crimping - with the correct tool - is far quicker and more reliable.

Soldering is reliable if you know what you're doing, i.e. make sure that the surfaces are clean, use the right amount of heat, time and solder. Soldering is something that require a certain flair to do right. A gas heated soldering iron sounds a bit worrying to me, I use a low voltage electrical iron soldering with a temperature monitoring and control.

environment,

They use butane gas cartridges and the temperature can be adjusted. You can also use them as a heat source for heating heatshrink. There's no cable to get in the way which is quite handy.

The message from Johannes contains these words:

I used to have a little Oryx gas iron and it was wonderful. Very controllable with enough power to do really big terminals if needed right down to swapping the tip for a pointed one and reflowing SMDs.

Proper crimps (and I'm tempted to exclude the cheap and nasty car grade crimps) are more reliable than soldered joints, especially in fairly nasty environments like engine bays. A properly soldered joint can last a good length of time, more so if it's hermatically sealed (e.g. adhesive heatshrink), but an exposed soldered joint is liable to fail (usually corrosion - although a poor joint [wicked or dry joint] can fail due to vibration). The one thing that I'd say about auto crimps is that you need both decent crimps, and a decent crimping tool. Oh, and the knowledge of which crimps to use on which sized cables.

Regarding a gas iron - these are surprisingly useful, there's enough "oomph" behind them to heat the bit (typically rated to equivalent to

50W) to the required temperature (temperature control is normally controlled by gas flow rate, and can be adjusted over quite a range), and the bits usually have enough mass to provide a suitable thermal store that the bit doesn't lose heat rapidly when applied to a loom. I quite like gas irons, until the catalyser is knackered (or holed). For car use, I'd actually perfer a gas iron to leccy.

I do. ;-)

The snag, as I said, is that soldering things on a car can be awkward. The work needs to be supported then you need one hand for the iron and one for the solder. And if you're working outdoors, as many will have to, any wind can cause problems - even with a fairly powerful iron.

It really is just so much easier to crimp - and with the correct tools this will look identical to the original loom.

IME the opposite is true. A good soldered joint is less susceptible to corrosion than a crimped joint, especially in hostile environments. A crimped joint no matter how well done, is inherently porous. Unlike a good soldered joint which fills all the cavities with solder which itself has a high resistance to corrosion. Like others though, I think crimping plus soldering, gives as near perfect a joint as you could wish for, and is probably better from a conductive POV as well. Mike.

Crimped joints without solder are the most reliable in a hostile environment. I tried them all on a 50's motorbike, you can't get more exposed than that, and my experience was that anything soldered falls apart in a couple of months whereas crimped joints last for years. I believe electrolytic processes are at work here due to the copper and tin/lead junction in a soldered joint, but a crimped joint has a less reactive combination of metals and is gas tight anyway at the contact surfaces and so can't corrode due to reaction with oxygen. If soldered joints are used they must be completely sealed from the environment.

Also, on military fast jets.

environment,

If a joint is soldered properly crimping it as well will have no benefit to conductivity whatsoever.

What?

In context, I meant a crimped and soldered joint is probably better from a conductive POV than a joint that is only crimped. Crimping first means the joint is firm as it is soldered. Giving a better chance of a well soldered joint. Mike.

Yep!

[...crimp and/or solder...]

Nope!

Crimps without solder are best. Tinned ends might be easier to handle but the solder compromises both mechanical and electrical quality of the crimp.

Get a proper ratchet crimping tool; only ~£15-20 and it'll last a lifetime just like the crimps it makes.

A

[...]

...and make a better connection than soldering.

A