Hoyt London

[granville_it]

Evening all, hope you can help.

I bought a pile of wheel weights and plumbers stick solder several days ago.

I went through the wheel weights to separate out the zinc ones.

When I went through the stick solder, I discovered two bars marked "Hoyt London". On the other side was stamped "A84". Despite a Google search, I could not identify the alloy.

My test for hardness is to use a pair of garden pruners. The "A84" bar is definitely softer than the stick solder and the wheel weights. I think there is a lot of lead in it.

Hopefully, one of you knowledgeable gentlemen can help with the alloy mix.

Thanks in advance, Mark

[P.K.]

That would be Hoyt Metal and London the city. The stuff you have was prolly for lining berings or something similar. As for the composition if it's softer than your WW, it maybe pure Pb and tin. I dunno.

[bumpo628]

I found a chart for "white metal". It's at the bottom of this page:
http://www.nationalsolder.com/white_metals.html

This is not a list of Hoyt products (although they are listed on the first item). The number system is interesting though. White metal appears to be named by the tin %. WM 90 is 90% tin, for example. However this is called "Hoyt #11", so clearly Hoyt used another convention. I think the A84 could refer to the lead content. At the bottom of the chart, they no longer use copper and the lead percentage is up to 80%. You could have something similar to that.

It's a total guess, obviously. However, you would think this would be harder than the WWs that you tested. Those percentages should make it close to linotype, but you said it is very soft.

Ultimately, it's going to go in the melting pot. So you may just need to melt it with a thermometer and compare the melting point to the chart in one of the stickies. I would just treat it as a very low tin solder and use it in small amounts to sweeten your alloys.

I also found that KC Engineering bought a company called Hoyt Engineering Business and they currently make white metal bearings. So, you might contact them to see if they have any information on your bars.
http://www.kceng.com/uk/index.php
http://www.kceng.com/uk/products_wm.php