Describe soldering materials and their uses.

The process of joining two or more metals is termed as soldering. An alloy of two or more metals of low melting point utilized for joining two or more base metals is termed as soldering material or termed as solder. The most usual solder is composed of 50 percent tin. Its melting point is regarding 185⁰C. Various commercial solders, include larger percentage of lead and several antimony with less tin, like the electrical conductivity of lead is only regarding half that of tin. For soldering flux is to be utilized. Solders are of two kinds- Soft solders and hard solders. Soft solders are consists of lead and tin in several proportions. Hard solders may be any solder along with a melting point above that of lead-tin solders. Soft solders are utilized in electronic devices and hard solders in power apparatus for making permanent associations. Illustrations: Tin - lead solders, Tin-Zinc solders, Tin-Antimony- lead solders, Lead-silver solders and Cadmium- silver solders.