Off season skills: Learn how to Solder

[Ether]

Originally Posted by efoote868

Not to pull this thread into a tangent, but another (surprising) thing I've found that contains lead are light strands that people put up for holidays.

Are you referring to tinsel?

Lead foil was a popular material for tinsel manufacture for several decades of the 20th century. Unlike silver, lead tinsel did not tarnish, so it retained its shine. However, use of lead tinsel was phased out after the 1960s due to concern that it exposed children to a risk of lead poisoning. In the United States, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concluded in August 1971 that lead tinsel caused an unnecessary risk to children, and convinced manufacturers and importers to voluntarily stop producing or importing lead tinsel after January 1, 1972. The FDA did not actually ban the product because the agency did not have the evidence needed to declare lead tinsel a "health hazard."

Modern tinsel is typically made from polyvinyl chloride (PVC) film coated with a metallic finish and sliced into thin strips. Coated mylar film also has been used.[3] These plastic forms of tinsel do not hang as well as tinsel made from heavy metals such as silver and lead.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinsel

When my brother and I were kids back in the late '50s, we used to roll the lead tinsel into a ball as we were taking it off the tree and then tightly compact it with our molar teeth to make lead "marbles". Probably explains a lot :-(