how to solder a battery?

[jimmyjet92@yahoo.com]

so im wanting to make my stick battery into a split battery and i tried soldering them and it just didnt stick.... what do i do?? im lost

[Mr Bill]

Just so happened I just did this. You need a hot iron. Mine get up to 1000 degrees. I've got 2 others that did exactly what your saying. You have to tin the iron, which is basically covering with solder till your tip is nice and covered with solder and wiping on wet sponge. Then tin the battery and buses or wire. Then put the bus on the battery and heat the the bus and apply solder. This works best with flat tip and rosin core solder. The hotter iron really makes all the difference in the world.

[WIDELOAD]

Yup Mr. Bill is on the $$$....you need a HOT iron...
I use a 100w big arsed thing i dubbed the light saber...F's me how hot it actually gets but its enough that you break into a sweat using it.

Here's a step by step on how i do it:
1.Rough up the ends of the cells.
2.Tin cells (heat end and apply solder) the leave aside to cool.
3. tin all your battery bars/bus'/wire
4. Put bar/bus/wire on end on cell
5. Press you iron down on top of bar/bus/wire & cell. The solder you put on there when you tinned it should melt and join the 2 together.
6. repeat for the rest of them

Now you need to make sure your iron is hot so you can work quickly. Short sharp busts of heat generally do less damage than long slow heat.
If you over heat the cells it will damage them.

Do a google search mate...there's bucket loads of info & how-tos on making packs.

[jimmyjet92@yahoo.com]

okay thanks that helps alot, what kind of iron? iv just got a regular soldering iron idk if thatll do

[WIDELOAD]

No worries mate.
The iron i use is a Wella brand one with the orange handle. It has a flat tip on it that works perfectly for battery bars. I think i paid about AUD$30-40 for it...Just check at your local electronics/hard ware and see what you can find...
I wouldnt get under a 80watt job though.

[Dillpickle]

You need around a 25 watt soldering iron... Make sure its not much more or you will melt everything.

[YJ_Driver]

The wattage isn't very important. As WIDELOAD stated what you need is a very hot iron tip to transfer heat very quickly to melt the solder and allow you to take the iron off quickly. The iron shouldn't be on there for more than 2 seconds, otherwise too much heat will reach the inside of the cell and cause damage. I use a 250W soldering gun which has a nice fat tip and gets hot fast.

[Mr Bill]

Not sure what wattage mine is but its a Weller iron and heats to right at 1000 degrees. I tryed some less irons and guns I had and the heat makes all the difference. Mine was only Ike 18 dollars at ace hardware.

[WIDELOAD]

Originally Posted by Dillpickle

You need around a 25 watt soldering iron... Make sure its not much more or you will melt everything.

uhhh...ok
I dont know where you got that from but 25 watts is no where near enough to solder up Nimh cells to make a battery pack...
Even with a fat tip on it, it simply wouldnt keep enough heat in the tip to do it.

It probably would work fine for soldering connectors to the wires, but not the wires or bars to the cells themselves.