Dave, When soldering on pin catches to a design that has no raised or
projection in the design I heat from the side opposite of the catch.
When the snipet melts I touch the flame to the pin side for just a
short time to insure the catch was properly heated. If the piece is
not safe to heat from the front side you will have to heat on the
catch side. Try to direct the flame away from the catch until the
snipet melts. Good Luck
Lee
Dave-- I’ve almost eliminated melted catches by point-soldering a
dab of solder on to the base of the catch, the top part of which is
being held by crosslock tweezers. As soon as it flows, I’m out of
there! Then, I melt solder on the spot where the catch is to be
placed. In this way, I can heat the heavier pin first, and pop the
catch on as the solder flows. Just a touch of heat will melt the
solder already on the base of the catch without melting the catch
itself. Works for me!
Dee
Dave… I have a design style that makes some real headaches in the
potential for slagging and fusing. I use white out on my pieces, It
can be thinned to place in very small places. I have a second paint
brush that is much smaller than the one that comes with the product
that can block the finest areas. It provides adequate protection for
all the tiny parts and joints. Note: It works only when completely
dry!
Recently, while in a rush, I paid another jeweler to do a soldering
job. I specified White Out to protect a joint. When he did the job,
he used grease on it! He ruined the piece! He then said that he
’didn’t trust white out!’ grrrrr! That is the last he will see of
me!
That being said, the white paint on things need good ventilation and
need a good brush to remove the material after the soldering is
complete. But compared to the loss of a part and time to redo it,
this is not a big deal.
Yellow ochre has supporters. On some jobs, it has worked, and has
none of the toxicity issues.
Another help in my work is annealing and rolling the solder to get it
THIN before cutting it into pallions.
Happy soldering…
Frif
To solder a pin catch I first paint the catch with Whiteout making
certain that none gets on the area for soldering. While the
whiteout is still wet I move the inside locking mechanism back and
forth to make certain the Whiteout gets down into the catch. To
solder it onto the jewelry I use a small pair of locking tweezers.
I ground one tip down to a long point that I can insert it into the
hole for the pin stem. The other tip is placed on the top of the
clasp (opposite side from the solder pad). This way I can hold the
pin catch for soldering and use the tweezers as a guide to easily
line up the pin catch in the right direction.
Brad Simon
www.BWSimon.com
Dear Dave,
Make a slight indentation where you want the pin catch to be. Put
some flux and solder on the area and place the finding on the piece
when it comes to temperature and the solder is flowing. For safety
I usually use a dab of antiflux anyway but I let it dry well before
soldering.
Good Luck,
Pauline
Dave, I can’t add much to the excellent advice you’ve already
received (white-out, etc). But I find that if you hold the catch in
cross-locking pliers so that the entire catch mechanism is within the
pliers–in other words, not the tip of the pliers but farther
back–you won’t have the problem, as the pliers action as a heat-sink
prevents solder flow into the catch. Hope this helps.
Gary Strickland, GJG
Hi Dave.
I’ve heard of using a bit of anti-flux in the mechanism but I prefer
free-hand placement of findings.
Place a snippet of solder where the finding will be on the back of
the piece and hold the finding in self-locking tweezers, ready to
place in proper position. Hold the torch in the other hand and heat
the piece til the solder flows. The tweezers act as a heat sink but
having the catch near (but not in) the flame, the catch is heated
indirectly before placement and needs only a flash of the flame to
bring it up to temperature when you place it into the pool of solder.
Don’t remove the tweezers til the solder “freezes”.
Excellent technique for lots of small stuff - especially earring
posts.
Good luck.
Pam
Wow! Dave, your inquiry got by my count 22 replies on the first day,
and more to come, I’m sure, excellent question with many excellent
answers! Get it hot, but not too hot is the first thing, but you
already knew that didn’t you, take it apart, or use some sort of
solder inhibitor. This last idea is my favorite, yellow ochre, white
out, pencil or graphite powder, even sharpie marker all make good
solder stops, but my personal favorite at my bench today (sorry no
pictures) is rouge powder taken from the chute of the dust collector
and dissoved into a saturated solution with lighter fluid. I call it
NOGO, as in “No Goin’ there” You can paint it on directly with a
brush and light it just the same as your boric/alcohol mixture,
you’ll want to light the boric/alcohol first and next apply NOGO ;o
Then into the ultrasonic a few minutes before pickling, if for no
other reason than to not get your pickle unneccessarily dirty. I
don’t know about any toxic worries here, just know that it is
another idea, one of many, it works well for me. And also, Thanks for
the Bench Exchange photo idea, I have really enjoyed it, hope to find
time to borrow the store camera some day and snap a few to add.
Paul. I am Paulisagoldsmith on Orchid, but fail misarably at keeping
up with all this great its all I can do to keep up with
my 3-year old and infant daughters, so offline I can be contacted at
PatnPaulReed@aol.com
Paul Reed
I recently came across a great product called Cold Shield (available
at Rio Grande). It acts as a heat shield and keeps solder from
running into areas such as catches! So, I place some of this
gel-like substance on a soldering pick and place it through the hole
for the pin stem. Then, solder as usual.
This Cold Shield also protects many stones from heat-related
damage, and…it’s non-toxic (unlike whiteout).
Good Luck!
Karen Strauss
Hi All! Thanks for the many, and varied responses! Just goes to show
the incredible diversity in our midst! Glad to know its an almost
universal problem, not just me! I thought I’d follow up with a few
thoughts. Will also weave in and out of a couple recent (and not so
recent) threads. 
Now that I’m back from my show, I’ve got a
little time to yak!
This job is actually a replacement of a catch that lost its swivel
part. Spent quite a bit of time and frustration trying to fix the
catch… finally deciding to cut the old one off and replace it. This
was made even more complicated due to the heat sensitive nature of
the rest of the piece. Multi-metal piece, but the catch is sterling,
being soldered to sterling. I had it packed in Heat Shield (yuck),
but was still quite concerned about heat being transmitted down the
heavy forged sterling element to which I was soldering the catch. One
reason for not being as liberal as I’d like to be in heating the
piece from beneath.
I really like the idea of placing the catch at the last minute, with
a pair of tweezers. I don’t know if I have the finesse to do it,
though. I have enough problem with proper alignment, even when
setting up the job cold. I like Brad Simon’s idea about the modified
tweezers (a lot), and Larry Seiger’s orthodontic wire. I suppose
stainless binding wire would also work, depending on gauge? I think I
should also investigate some of the extra-easy silver solder. Lots of
other good ideas and tips, as well. BTW, water based White-Out can be
reconstituted if it dries out (just add water 
) and can be thinned
to a desired viscosity.
I really wish I had a Sparkie fusion welder! Would make stupid
little jobs like this a no-brainer. I wonder if I can get a grant
from somewhere to buy one?!?
Someone mentioned powdered and/or paste solder. Based on (I believe)
Daniel Grandi’s idea a while back about using powdered solder for
earring posts, I tried it. A great improvement over the snippet
technique I had been using. I bought a syringe of hard silver paste
solder a while back, but it dried out before I used it. I recently
tried reconstituting it with some green liquid flux, and it works
great. I actually squirt some out into a small container and apply
with a toothpick (for better control). I built a chain a couple weeks
ago using this stuff, and it was a big improvement over snippets. A
little tricky to see when it flows, though, since it’s already
flowed on in a sense.
Thanks again, everyone!
Dave
Dave Sebaste
Sebaste Studio and
Carolina Artisans’ Gallery
Charlotte, NC (USA)
dave@sebaste.com
Dave, This may be something you already thought of, but it’s worth a
try if not: Sometimes I’ve thought I fused a catch, and then after
soaking in pickle for awhile, or gently soaking in simmering water
with a little ammonia, the f flux glass somes out and voila-! the
catch works free with a little encouragement from a plier. Hope this
helps.
Ruth Shapiro
www.growingupjewish.com
This bit from experience might not fit the thread, since I have
missed some of that. Alas. Yet, to prevent fused “anything” in
delicate soldering is the point of this post. The old solutions of
"prevent solder flow" will work in some intances, such as the
admonition of ocre or other agents to dirty the joints. What I
thought an original discovery has since been published and it proves
many are looking for answers and some are fortunate to find those
and share.
From 25 years of bench experience, I can say the best way to prevent
fused catches or even bleeding of solders into mesh gold watch bands
when doing a shortening job is this: Apply correction fluid used for
covering mistakes on paper, also known as Wite Out or similar
solutions. The stuff appears to contain a metal oxide pigment. When
painted on the item to be soldered, hard solders simply do not flow
there. This material is relocated by alcohol. I suggest the boric
acid/alcohol or other “firescale” perventive coating be applied
first and dried. Then, when cool, apply the correction fluid
precisely. The solder will be contained and not cross the coating.
This works well for covering engraving inside ring shanks near a
solder joint, hinge pins with tubes, etc.
Do not use with platinum and work with such a high heat. You will
create a ceramic like coating almost impossible to remove. For gold
and silver work, feel free to solder "fig 8: safety catches, mesh
wire work, pin catches, etc., with ease. If needed, coat the item to
be soldered then gently file or otherwise remove the coating from
the area needing the solder.
Thomas.
@Sp.T