Soldering Corroded Wires

[gordwedman]

Those black wires are a pain. Do I replace the entire wiring harness on my 30 year old engine or just solder new connections where necessary? I solder. I spread out strands and go at them with sand paper. Move them around a few times repeating the sanding gets tbem pretty clean. I have a couple of Kester brand flux pencils of in my electrical kit. These have the RMA type rosin flux dissolved in alcohol. You wipe the wires with the pen and the mixture flows onto the wire. Adds to what is in the solder.

[d design]

It is important to figure out what caused the coroded wire. If it is a very old wire its likely just general wear and tear, but any salt water or moisture near termanals and connections you can expect it to go bad surprisingly quickly. But preventing corrosion is key. Yep soldering coroded wires can be a nightmare. Coroded wires also have more resistance. Spray something like this on your connections once in a while.

[spearfish]

cut old wire away till you come to good copper wire then slide a slieve of water repelent heat shrink over the wire and then solder new wire to joint then cover joint with heat shrink or self amalamgation tape, big word spelling could be wrong

[spearfish]

Forgot fat bhouy coke will clean wires, but its preferable to start snipping till you find good copper, as some has said it does increase resistance using dodgy wire hence fire hazard.