Today i decided i should build me some cables, problem is, i have no experience in the matter.
I went around the web and found this extensive guide:
The guide seems to be pretty complete, but i have some additional questions:
1- He mentions using a 35-50w iron, i have an 80w iron, do i need to buy a less powerful iron or can i use my 80w one?
2- Is there a better type of solder to use, and if there is, what type is it?
3- Also, how good is this guide in general?
The wattage is not so important, what you want it the right temperature for the solder you’re using and the material you’re soldering. It’s a learned skill through practice. If you have an adjustable soldering stating you take a lot of the guesswork away.
Ideally for audio you want something with silver content, 3 to 7% but. Solder that doesn’t have lead will be a lot harder to work with than the ROHS environment friendly solder. ALWAYS use rosin core solder as it’s going to be much easier to work with for a novice and lead the better results.
The guide is good, feels a little dated though with the equipment and cable references.
Treat it as a hobby/passtime and be ready to make cable three or four times before you’re happy with the results. Cable you can reuse, buy three times as many terminators as you think you’ll want.
There are a couple of good threads here on the forum. Do a search for DIY Cables.
Enjoy.
Thank you very much!
I’ll check the threads on the forum and also do some testing on my own, i have some spare cable at home that i can test with, i’ll buy some connectors and see what i can come up with.
Depending on how chunky the connectors you want to use are, 80W may not be enough (also depends on the style of heating element in the iron).
I use a general purpose lead-free electronic solder (Composition: Sn96.5 Ag3 Cu0.7). Without properly cleaned (= degreased) surfaces, it does not want to stick. So flux pen to the rescue!
My spool of “Felder Sn100Ni+” (Composition: Sn99,25Cu0,7Ni0,05) is much nicer to work with, also cost me twice as much.