tie wire

[bloke]

This is what hardware stores call the gauge of soft uncoated or black steel wire that I like to use to hold tuba parts together when I have to use wire. I didn't know that it was called tie wire. It's used in construction for holding rebar together before pouring concrete over it. Of course, I knew about that, but I didn't know the formal name.

If anyone else happens to be ignorant as I was, I hope this helps you find some slightly thicker soft wire for holding things together before soldering.

It should also be noted that if you're using this gauge, you need to be pretty careful, because it can dent, which is why I usually use smaller gauge if I can.

[gocsick]

I've got a spool in my garage.. tag say "soft black annealed 16 gauge tie wire" Don't know of a PROPER name

Being an non-expert I found that aircraft stainless lock wire in smaller gauge (0.020") works really well. It is thin enough that if I over tightened it it would snap before denting anything. It is more expensive and a pair of safety wire pliers is helpful. I have a few spools in the toolbox from my aircraft mechanic days.

[bloke]

That's fine but I use the same type of wire as tie wire in a smaller gauge, because it's a good bit cheaper than stainless steel. After all, I'm throwing it all away after I'm done with it...

Thanks for the information though. Others may choose to use it.

The smaller gauge being gentler on brass is why I nearly always use something smaller than what I linked above, but sometimes something larger is called for.

[MiBrassFS]

Funny you should mention this. I just finally used up the supply I had and restocked. The last stuff was on a spool. This time it came in a nifty hang card blister pack dispenser. I don’t use much of it, so 50 ft. should last me a while.

“Tie wire.”

[bloke]

Funny you should mention this. I just finally used up the supply I had and restocked. The last stuff was on a spool. This time it came in a nifty hang card blister pack dispenser. I don’t use much of it, so 50 ft. should last me a while.

“Tie wire.”

I use it fairly often when doing some of these young scholar repairs on all these torn up tubas.

The typical donut shaped and sized spool is about 350 ft. I believe I've had this spool approximately since forever. It was time to replace it, because I think there's only about thirty feet left on it, and I didn't know what to call it in order to find a place to buy it. I don't particularly like buying stuff like this from Wisconsin, as they're not going to have particularly competitive prices on common supplies such as this. I called Ace Hardware (basically a hardware "convenience" store, as I'm sure most here understand) and asked if they had any soft steel wire that was approximately or slightly under a 16th of an inch diameter. It was a young person. They came back to the phone and reported that they only had "doo-dah" and "oh-duh-doo-dah-dey" wire. I'm pretty sure I pissed them off when I said, "What you mean is you don't know what I'm looking for and you don't know where it is." If I pissed them off, good on me. ... I think it might have been that 30 something year old daughter of the owner who I talked to.

The thing is that the Wisconsin supplier (that marks it way up) calls it "soft wire" (so that we can't use a search engine and find "tie wire" and realize that it's way cheaper and locally available.

This is one those things that I probably won't buy on eBay, because it weighs a good bit and postage would negate any really incredible bargain price. These spools are usually about 13 bucks. I doubt that Home Depot and Lowe's are any cheaper than Ace or the old patched wooden floor hardware store in our county seat's town square, and the big-boxes are forty minutes minimum away from blokeplace.

"tie wire" ... Yeah, to hold together fugged-up tubas before getting them completely stuck back together.

[gocsick]

https://www.acehardware.com/departments ... re/5027558

According to the website they have it in stock at the ACE near @bloke 's

[bloke]

https://www.acehardware.com/departments ... re/5027558

According to the website they have it in stock at the ACE near @bloke 's

Yep. That's where the young lady told me they didn't have anything, but that's before I knew to call it tie wire.

This is why most of us try to buy most things online these days. It's cheaper, the stores either don't have it or they don't know that they have it, and their service personnel or nearly useless - other than scanning our item and waiting for us to jab a piece of plastic into a slot.

It's also why a whole bunch of us are trying to grow our own food.