RE: Steel Core Elements

I am sorry, I can be of no help on the subject.

But while the discussion is open, I'll present a related question that has
puzzled me for many years. I've asked this of many electrical engineering
types and nobody ever came up with an answer.

We all know that at certain frequencies, stranded wire is a much better
conductor than solid for a givin wire gage due to the so-called 'skin effect'.

With that in mind, what happens to the superior properties of the stranded
wire if you tin it (i.e. dip it into a bath of molten tin/lead) for the full
length of the wire? Will it behave more like solid? Completely like a solid?
Or perhaps electrons traveling through this wire would prefer the skin of the
copper, but find additional path through the skin of the solder, thus making
the tinned stranded copper an even better conductor.

What sorts of activities occur in the valence regions between the
copper-tin/lead interface?

I've heard arguments about this in the past. Especially when dealing with
ground busses. You definately want to use stranded if you care at all about
RF. But when you solder up a connection, say midpoint on the bus wire, should
you be concerned about letting the solder 'wick' out past the joint?

Very curious,
Rich Looke

On Mon, 12 Feb 1996 06:37:19 -0500 hbshaw_at_top.monad.net wrote:
>I have been watching with interest the discussion about copper over steel
wire
>elements and agree with the posted comments. I would like to add an
exclamation
>point to the posting about corrosion - if you have problems with unprotected
>aluminium you don't want to use copperweld type elements.
>
>Too many years at sea with the USN punctuated by many antennas crashing to
the decks
>has made me a real fan of using non-magnetic stainless in a hostile
environment.
>Coating elements does extend the life of copperweld. The best coating I have
found
>to date is high quality car wax. When applied every 3 - 4 months the copper
stays
>bright and trouble spots are easily found. Polymer coatings not only effect
the
>electrical performance but also crack and let in the bad stuff and none I
have ever
>tried has the UV resistance demonstrated by simple car wax. Probably not a
good
>solution for product development, but it sure works in the ham brew world.
>Cheers!
>Buzz Shaw - - WA1NHP
>
>
Received on Tue Feb 13 1996 - 02:41:00 EST