I'm not really confusing the two, although I wasn't as clear as I could
have been. I understand the difference ... I just don't see the point
of using hard silver brazing rods.
1. You don't need them for radial work. A decent mechanical
connection (even twisted wires) and normal lead-free low temperature
silver bearing solder works fine with minimal hassle or special gear.
2. For lightning grounds with a few connections, a proper mechanical
clamp or an exothermic weld, both of which are readily available to
hams, are as good or better than brazed connections using materials and
equipment that are not as readily available.
Yeah, if I was working on commercial gear with lots of connections I'd
probably use high silver content brazing rods as well, but that wasn't
what the original post was about.
Dave AB7E
On 8/7/2015 1:44 PM, charlie@thegallos.com wrote:
<snip>> For lightning protection (or any high current application), solder
seems
to me to be a very poor choice. Solder, including silver solder, almost
invariably will be the highest resistance element (and the weakest
thermally) in the system and will act like an explosive fuse if it takes
a hit. As Jim says, clamps or welds are the way to go for this.
73,
Dave AB7E
Dave, you are confusing "soft" silver solder with "Hard" silver solder aka
silver brazing, which is explicitly allowed by the NEC. Most places don't
do it, because Cadwelds are easier, but ask the local engineer at the say
AM radio station how they connect their grounds, or the local cell guy how
they attach ground straps - yep, call in some guy with a welding torch and
some real silver solder
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