Soldering iron tip...

[Externet]

Hello.

Once I made a gold soldering iron tip for electronics work.  The tin Sn solder dissolved the gold instantly. 😒

Would a tip made of silver Ag survive or will also react with tin ?

[MigL]

Why ?
Copper works just fine as long as you keep it tinned.
The material composition of the tip is not as important for heat transfer as the liquid tin coating.
( and always use good rosin flux, especially when doing work on surface mount components )

[chenbeier]

Solder tips made by copper coated with iron, to prevent the dissolving. Pure copper , gold or silver get alloy with tin in will be dissolved.

[MigL]

Whether copper silver or gold, once the alloy is formed with tin, no further 'dissolving' takes place; that's why I suggested keeping the tip well tinned.

I would hope you realize that circuit board traces and pads are copper with a very thin anti-oxidization gold covering.
Do the pads 'dissolve' when you solder a component on them ???

[Externet]

Hi MigL.   Did not have a chance to check against the gold plating on some traces; as soon as the hot gold tip touched tin, the gold disappeared/eroded into liquid? inside? the liquid tin wetting the tip.   It was a long ago at my workplace while migrating production into lead-free solders.  Was an unexpected surprise learned.  Never tried with silver Ag nor other metal tip, Ti, Cd, Zn, Ni, Cr...  The intention was to achieve more tin wettability of the tip, if remember well.

[MigL]

5 hours ago, Externet said:

the hot gold tip touched tin, the gold disappeared/eroded into liquid?

Disappeared/eroded ???
Old circuit boards with copper traces, a thousandth of an inch gold plating, and old tin solder on top, are regularly sent overseas, where they reclaim the gold plating.

Gold Recovery : 8 Steps (with Pictures) - Instructables

So obviously it does not disappear.

[Externet]

Hi.   Yes, visually disappeared. 😳

With the new tip made with 1mm thick gold clad; turned the heat on for the iron. 

When applying the tin solder to the hot tip, (tinning) the gold ẃashed away, disappeared, melted, liquified, dissolved, left a void, merged into the liquid hot tin wetting the tip.  I have no other words.  Could not see any gold any more. 🤔  In matter of a second or two.

Image borrowed from the web that nearly appears to describe it: