Solder detection--?

Jewelry Discussion
1

OK, here’s one fer ya’ll. I have alot of silver wire solder
thats not marked as to melting temp since I forget sometimes to
put a kinked code in the wire. So how do you tell what grade of
solder one is? I’ve tried lining up pieces and hitting with the
torch to see which melts first but can’t heat them all evenly to
find out. Don’t want to risk using easy solder on something down
the line for not knowing----a fatal mistake in silver
work…Dave

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2

Dave, Try just heating 2 pieces of solder at a time. you should
be able to heat them equally. Then you can compare them to the
other pieces, two by two. It takes more steps, but works.

Karen

3 
   So how do you tell what grade of solder one is? I've tried
lining up pieces and hitting with the torch to see which melts
first but can't heat them all evenly to find out.

G’day; How about cleaning and fluxing small pieces and laying
them fairly close together on a piece of flat metal about about
1/16 or so thick and heating strongly from below? Not brass-
that melts below enamelling grade solder. Worth trying, I
reckon. I tried it and got a good result, but the metal had to be
red-hot and I had to be a bit patient.

        /\
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4

use a small piece of copper it works great. Lloyd