Joining Stainless Wire
 

In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06" give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

Mostly the join would be of the same size wire to itself, but occassionally it might be joining a lighter wire to a heavier wire. The resulting joint needs to be corrosion resistant, but not to an extreme. It is not exposed to strong acids. Hard or sal****er at worst. Life in use does not need to be infinite, but over a lifetime it might see several hundred hours of immersion with thousands of dunking cycles.

If the resulting joint is 75% as strong as the original wire or better that would probably be satisfactory. The wire is most likely a 308-316 spring wire, but others might be used.

The exact application is not really important. Its not a secret, but I often find that when you express an application people begin to critique the why and how of the end, rather than focus on the now problem. If you know or guess the application please keep it to yourself until the specific task has been thought about for atleast a few days. Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.

Bob

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 10:26:27 -0700 (PDT), Bob La Londe
wrote:

In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06" give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

Mostly the join would be of the same size wire to itself, but occassionally it might be joining a lighter wire to a heavier wire. The resulting joint needs to be corrosion resistant, but not to an extreme. It is not exposed to strong acids. Hard or sal****er at worst. Life in use does not need to be infinite, but over a lifetime it might see several hundred hours of immersion with thousands of dunking cycles.

If the resulting joint is 75% as strong as the original wire or better that would probably be satisfactory. The wire is most likely a 308-316 spring wire, but others might be used.

The exact application is not really important. Its not a secret, but I often find that when you express an application people begin to critique the why and how of the end, rather than focus on the now problem. If you know or guess the application please keep it to yourself until the specific task has been thought about for atleast a few days. Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.

Bob

Silver brazing. I have a fishing reel built by hand in the 1930s that
was used for 40 years in salt water. It's all silver-brazed stainless,
Monel, and nickel-silver ("German silver," or cupronickel). It has
some green patina, probably because there was copper in the braze, but
the joints remain strong.

As for your 75% requirement, here's strength data from the AWS:

http://www.aws.org/wj/amwelder/9-00/fundamentals.html

--
Ed Huntress

Joining Stainless Wire
 

"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often
comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all
done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06"
give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take
to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

big snip

The exact application is not really important. Its not a secret, but I
often find that when you express an application people begin to critique the
why and how of the end, rather than focus on the now problem. If you know
or guess the application please keep it to yourself until the specific task
has been thought about for atleast a few days. Its not a secret. I just
would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If
nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.

Bob

I'm pretty sure I know what you're doing ... Get a MOT and build a tiny
spot welder . ISTR you're into electronics too ? Build a timer , bigger wire
more time . It's going to take 2 fixtures , one for the side/side and one
that can be reconfigured for the end/end and end/side welds .
--
Snag

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On 8/10/2013 1:26 PM, Bob La Londe wrote:
In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06" give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

Mostly the join would be of the same size wire to itself, but occassionally it might be joining a lighter wire to a heavier wire. The resulting joint needs to be corrosion resistant, but not to an extreme. It is not exposed to strong acids. Hard or sal****er at worst. Life in use does not need to be infinite, but over a lifetime it might see several hundred hours of immersion with thousands of dunking cycles.

If the resulting joint is 75% as strong as the original wire or better that would probably be satisfactory. The wire is most likely a 308-316 spring wire, but others might be used.

The exact application is not really important. Its not a secret, but I often find that when you express an application people begin to critique the why and how of the end, rather than focus on the now problem. If you know or guess the application please keep it to yourself until the specific task has been thought about for atleast a few days. Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.

Bob



The wire mills use a process similar to a bandsaw blade welder.

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 10:26:27 -0700 (PDT), Bob La Londe
wrote:

In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06" give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

Mostly the join would be of the same size wire to itself, but occassionally it might be joining a lighter wire to a heavier wire. The resulting joint needs to be corrosion resistant, but not to an extreme. It is not exposed to strong acids. Hard or sal****er at worst. Life in use does not need to be infinite, but over a lifetime it might see several hundred hours of immersion with thousands of dunking cycles.

If the resulting joint is 75% as strong as the original wire or better that would probably be satisfactory. The wire is most likely a 308-316 spring wire, but others might be used.

The exact application is not really important. Its not a secret, but I often find that when you express an application people begin to critique the why and how of the end, rather than focus on the now problem. If you know or guess the application please keep it to yourself until the specific task has been thought about for atleast a few days. Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.

Bob

Spot welding if side by side is quick and simple. Its also doable if
end to end, though a bit harder

Silver solder is also quite useful, but is much more time consuming


--
""Almost all liberal behavioral tropes track the impotent rage of small
children. Thus, for example, there is also the popular tactic of
repeating some stupid, meaningless phrase a billion times" Arms for
hostages, arms for hostages, arms for hostages, it's just about sex, just
about sex, just about sex, dumb,dumb, money in politics,money in
politics, Enron, Enron, Enron. Nothing repeated with mind-numbing
frequency in all major news outlets will not be believed by some members
of the populace. It is the permanence of evil; you can't stop it." (Ann
Coulter)

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On 8/10/2013 1:37 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
...
http://www.aws.org/wj/amwelder/9-00/fundamentals.html

Nice article - thanks for the link. Bob

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 19:49:04 -0400, Bob Engelhardt
wrote:

On 8/10/2013 1:37 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
...
http://www.aws.org/wj/amwelder/9-00/fundamentals.html

Nice article - thanks for the link. Bob

If you want more about silver brazing, Handy & Harman of Canada has
been the best source for many years, even back when I was at _AM_, in
the '70s and '80s. They published their brazing handbook online, for
free.

It appears they've organized their information at the website of their
subsidiary, Lucas Milhaupt:

http://www.lucasmilhaupt.com/en-US/brazingfundamentals/

Try the links at the bottom of the page. This appears to be where the
American Welding Society got their information for that summary above.
The L-H source goes into more detail.

--
Ed Huntress

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 20:18:41 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 19:49:04 -0400, Bob Engelhardt
wrote:

On 8/10/2013 1:37 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
...
http://www.aws.org/wj/amwelder/9-00/fundamentals.html

Nice article - thanks for the link. Bob

If you want more about silver brazing, Handy & Harman of Canada has
been the best source for many years, even back when I was at _AM_, in
the '70s and '80s. They published their brazing handbook online, for
free.

It appears they've organized their information at the website of their
subsidiary, Lucas Milhaupt:

http://www.lucasmilhaupt.com/en-US/brazingfundamentals/

Try the links at the bottom of the page. This appears to be where the
American Welding Society got their information for that summary above.
The L-H source goes into more detail.

Aha! It looks like the whole book is still available for free. You do
have to register:

http://www.brazingbook.com/

--
Ed Huntress

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 13:37:06 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Sat, 10 Aug 2013 10:26:27 -0700 (PDT), Bob La Londe
wrote:

In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06" give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

Mostly the join would be of the same size wire to itself, but occassionally it might be joining a lighter wire to a heavier wire. The resulting joint needs to be corrosion resistant, but not to an extreme. It is not exposed to strong acids. Hard or sal****er at worst. Life in use does not need to be infinite, but over a lifetime it might see several hundred hours of immersion with thousands of dunking cycles.

If the resulting joint is 75% as strong as the original wire or better that would probably be satisfactory. The wire is most likely a 308-316 spring wire, but others might be used.

The exact application is not really important. Its not a secret, but I often find that when you express an application people begin to critique the why and how of the end, rather than focus on the now problem. If you know or guess the application please keep it to yourself until the specific task has been thought about for atleast a few days. Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.

Bob

Silver brazing. I have a fishing reel built by hand in the 1930s that
was used for 40 years in salt water. It's all silver-brazed stainless,
Monel, and nickel-silver ("German silver," or cupronickel). It has
some green patina, probably because there was copper in the braze, but
the joints remain strong.

As for your 75% requirement, here's strength data from the AWS:

http://www.aws.org/wj/amwelder/9-00/fundamentals.html


+1 on silver brazing.

Michael Koblic,
Campbell River, BC

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On 8/10/2013 8:18 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
....
Try the links at the bottom of the page. This appears to be where the
American Welding Society got their information for that summary above.
The L-H source goes into more detail.

I think that I've downloaded the brazing book and have it stored
_somewhere_. What I liked about AWS article was that it is a summary.
Don't confuse me with details.

Bob

Joining Stainless Wire
 

In article , Bob
La Londe wrote:

In another group I read joining two round pieces of stainless wire often
comes up in conversation. End to end, side by side, and end to side are all
done or desired from time to time. The wire sizes range from 0.03" to 0.06"
give or take. I would be curious what approach some of you guys might take
to do these processes quickly and efficiently.

Mostly the join would be of the same size wire to itself, but occassionally
it might be joining a lighter wire to a heavier wire. The resulting joint
needs to be corrosion resistant, but not to an extreme. It is not exposed to
strong acids. Hard or sal****er at worst. Life in use does not need to be
infinite, but over a lifetime it might see several hundred hours of immersion
with thousands of dunking cycles.

If the resulting joint is 75% as strong as the original wire or better that
would probably be satisfactory. The wire is most likely a 308-316 spring
wire, but others might be used.

I recall a fellow who made birdcages commented on my thread about
choosing a stainless alloy that would not rust after being heated to a
red heat. The thread was "Making double-prong skewers" in September
2010.

The birdcages were custom-made and large. His process was to spotweld
the 316L stainless steel wire (I was using 0.125" diameter and he was
using at least that thickness), clean the joint to remove fire scale,
and then silver braze the spotwelded area. This was a bit stronger,
looked good, and protected the birds' feet.


Joe Gwinn

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Saturday, August 10, 2013 1:26:27 PM UTC-4, Bob La Londe wrote:

Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days.



Bob

I second making a spot welder using MOT's. Silver brazing would be fine if you had less than about 25 to do. But a spot welder is the thing if you have very many to do.

But I am curious what the application is. Dan

Joining Stainless Wire
 

On Tuesday, August 13, 2013 4:47:48 PM UTC-6, wrote:
On Saturday, August 10, 2013 1:26:27 PM UTC-4, Bob La Londe wrote: Its not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share in a few days. Bob I second making a spot welder using MOT's. Silver brazing would be fine if you had less than about 25 to do. But a spot welder is the thing if you have very many to do. But I am curious what the application is. Dan

Sounds like sal****er fishing leaders or some kind of rigging for sal****er fishing. I've seen some of this sort of thing on the pegs at various sport shops in CA along the coast. Some of the reels looked like they could double for light winches.

Stan

Joining Stainless Wire
 

wrote in message
...
On Tuesday, August 13, 2013 4:47:48 PM UTC-6, wrote:
On Saturday, August 10, 2013 1:26:27 PM UTC-4, Bob La Londe wrote: Its
not a secret. I just would like to see some pure thought on specific
process ideas first. If nobody has blurted it out I will be glad to share
in a few days. Bob I second making a spot welder using MOT's.
Silver brazing would be fine if you had less than about 25 to do. But a
spot welder is the thing if you have very many to do. But I am curious
what the application is. Dan

Sounds like sal****er fishing leaders or some kind of rigging for
sal****er fishing. I've seen some of this sort of thing on the pegs at
various sport shops in CA along the coast. Some of the reels looked like
they could double for light winches.

Stan

Fishing Lure Making. Yes.