[BC] Irons for silver soldering copper strap

[JYRussell@academicplanet.com]

Hey, Cowboy... a question about strapping
Smaller stuff... I didn't have an ocy-cet torch, or even a Bernz-O-Matic 
handy,  wanted to do a a decent job on some 2" stuff.

  Everybody says soft-solder isn't appropriate, however, with no torch I 
tried to rely on the amount of surface area contact.  Made a pair of folds, 
45 deg. the end of each strap and put them together so that after mating the 
parts, you finsih folding the excess back over onto the other strap, forming 
a 90 deg bend but with a solid over lap of the 45 plus about two inches onto 
each strap.  Got 'em tight, but didn't hammer down to the point of unduly 
stressing the sharp folds... used a pair of 1/4 x 20 nc bolts at each end, 
then soaked it in soft solder ---

  I used the solder thinking I would be keeping bugs and dirt out, and 
hopefully keeping the contact face of the straps together long enough to 
route at least one strike to ground... figuring I'd find  where the lead 
sprayed all over after a 'real' strike.

  sound nutty, or ok but could be better, or what?

Jason R.

(PS - the last IRON I used for soldering anything sat in a pot with several 
other irons.  About 6 inches long, and about 3/4 of an inch square... used 
on standing seam roofs...)