Wire is fluxed, 60/40 rosin core solder and iron set to 350c.
No wetting occured. Could It be the cheap tip/iron (only used a few times)
Only the first time I used the iron the tip tinned after that nothing stuck
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Need more watts, also put solder on the tip of the iron, and not on the wire.
Or the cable is coated with some crap, which is unlikely imo.
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Try temp at 400 soldering is easy, I could not solder once, but practice makes perfect just keet trying, probably loads on YouTube
Try this heat the area first with tip, then add the solder.
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Keep tip Clean get a. Sponge and soak it with water and wipe the tip when it’s hot, that will keep it Clean, I usually put solder on the tip t he. Wipe it off.
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That looks like big wire (12AWG or so) so there’s gonna be a lot of mass in it. As @Acido said a more powerful iron can deliver more heat energy at the same temp setting and @jonisingt35r 's suggestion to set to 400 will likely work for wire, it just makes everything a bit more smokey and canreally fuck up a VESC/nylon connector/anything that’s more sensitive to heat.
My suggestion is just to hold the iron in contact with the wire for longer (edit: this is assuming you don’t want to buy a bigger fancier iron. That would help, but isn’t mandatory). Lots of mass, soaks up lots of heat, just leave it there till it soaks and it’ll eventually melt the solder on the other side. You should also definitely tin the iron though - the liquid solder is a much better conductor of heat into the wire than a dry iron. Feed the solder in to the point where the iron touches the wire to start with, it should build up a decent amount of solder there relatively quickly. This is the same idea as above - liquid solder on the wire conducts heat from the iron much better than a dry wire.
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Maby try on a smaller wire first get the hang of it then try thicker wires You will get it.
Try to solder small wires together, then try larger wire.
Clean the tip. Put more solder on the tip. Then rather than trying to melt the solder on the other side of the wire, put the solder closer to the soldering iron and then slowly work your way away from the iron. A little bit of flux on the wire will help a lot though it’s not strictly necessary.
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What @janpom said is what’s going to work best. Put rosin on the wire first. Then make sure your tip is clean. Then, solder on the tip of the iron to help it conduct heat. Touch the iron to the wire and then feed the solder to the point where your iron and the wire touch. As with any soldering joint, make sure the solder is completely liquid and shiny before removing your iron. You will also want your iron hot- at least 400C
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Do you mean 400C? OP is already at 350c so that’s like 660F
Apologies yes I do mean Celsius. Edited.
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Tried 3 tips and after one use they don’t tin anymore, ive tried cleaning and a re-tinning method I saw online still docent work. Even if I manage to get the solder melted it pools up on the wire and a drops down on the underside on both 12 and 24awg wires
You got a crappy soldering iron, invest in something good and you will solder like a Pro. Look into the TS100 soldering iron made by SainSmart, don’t get the cheap knock offs from bang-good!
I use 400 degree Celsius when soldering, tip size and shape will also make a big difference.
A bad soldering joint will just fall apart and not deliver peak current. So do it right the first time or have fun later taking things apart and redoing the work.
When soldering, you need to make sure the wire or whatever your soldering to is clean. Use a 60/40 solder with flux core. Solder the tip of the soldering iron, heat the area you want to solder, and then apply the solder and the heat will suck the solder onto the surface or into the wire.
Also keep cleaning the tip, don’t let the it get black or crusty looking. I use steel wool to clean the tip between soldering and then “tap” the tip on damp sponge sitting in water, then I re-solder the tip before the next soldering attempt.
This is hands down the best soldering video series
Review of TS100
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Clean the wire with an alcohol pad. You probably twisted it with your fingers and transferred dirt/oil. This doesn’t really matter with hotter soldering irons, but with the lower power ones it does. This actually happened to me the other night- stranded wire wouldn’t wet out with my lower power iron until I cleaned it with alcohol.
In addition to what everyone else said. Lots of good advice.
It’s hard to get anything from the video. I can’t see what’s going on at the wire.
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Maybe I missed this but how many watts is the iron? Also, with wire that thick, a larger tip on your iron will transfer heat much better. I almost exclusively use the SH-K shape below when doing larger gauge wires
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60W
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Ya, not enough juice. I would echo the sentiments above- buy a better iron. I have an 85 watt and that does most of what I need it to do. The TS100 is a good choice. A lot of people use wellers. This is the station I have and it works just fine and is affordable.
Edit this one is 72 watts. I have an 85 watt that is identical to this rig.
SainSmart docent ship to me, what about miniware?
Chop that wire off and try again. This time, let the iron sit there until it wets out. As long as it takes. Make sure there is a big blob of solder between the tip and the wire. Do you have flux?
I don’t think you need a more powerful iron. Just the right prep work. Do you have any solvents? Acetone, alcohol? Do you have different tips, are you running max temp? Copper sinks heat- its just sucking the heat out of the iron, and sending it down the wire, but it can only do that so long. Just let it sit there, and start with new wire, and clean it. Lay the iron on the wire sideways if you have to to get more contact area.
Pretty sure the TS100 is like 20 watts or something, but it works well when everything else is aligned.
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Ill give it a try
ive got flux
got thinner tips, the one in the videos is the biggest
adjustable up to 450C
If the one in the video is the biggest, lay it on the wire sideways so that you’re getting more contact, and just be patient, and watch it, it should start to absorb. It gets harder and harder to solder the same wire if at first it doesn’t work. It builds up almost like an oxide layer that takes a lot of heat to break through.
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