Part 6 - The Remedy

The eagle-eyed viewer may have spotted (from the photo in Section 4) that the fix for this was to solder the joints circled in Section 5.

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The solder of choice was leaded solder - still mandated in safety-critical applications at the time of writing in 2022 for its superior performance versus lead-free solder - although any solder should do the job. It is worth noting that lead-free solder is generally harder to work with and does require higher temperatures to achieve a decent quality joint (>350°C ideally). The other components required for this to be successful are:

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1. A big tip (no giggles please). A general soldering rule is to use the biggest iron tip that is practical for the application, and relatively speaking, this is a very non-precision operation, so the biggest iron tip to hand should be used to heat the joint quickly and evenly.

2. Flux. I prefer the 'jelly' flux, good rosin stuff at that. Flux helps to clean the joint and allows the solder to adhere and flow better. Given the amount of oil and/or residue on the metal contacts, this really is mandatory, and should be used to excess (although, really, there is no such thing as too much flux); the amount of flux in the core of the solder is really not enough.

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General good soldering practice should also be observed: apply flux to the area, apply the iron for a few seconds to heat the joint, feed in the solder onto the iron/joint, remove the solder, wait a further second or so, remove the iron and allow the joint to cool.

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Subjectively, this was more difficult than I first anticipated, although this was likely due to poor cleaning beforehand - the solder seemed hesitant to stick to the contacts as well as I had hoped.

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Feel free to refer back to the photo in Section 4 for an idea of how the joints should look, although that photo should be considered a bare minimum - why skimp on doing the job properly when the TPS is already removed and opened up; do it once, do it right.

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Hopefully, this can help someone keep one of these marvellous vehicles going on he road a little longer, and encourage people to repair these increasingly rare parts rather than shelling out on new ones, especially once they no-longer exist.

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