When to use different brazing rod

[Rotate]

I have been brazing small steel parts using brazing flux sold by Lincoln Electric (white powder, I think it's borax) and using plain old brass wire. It works very well and I like the fact that I can use different gauge wire for different jobs. Is this essentially same as the rod that you buy which has thick white flux coated on it?

Also, when do you use the brass rod v.s. the silver solder which I believe commonly has blue colored flux. I like using the brass rod because it doesn't flare up like the silver solder flux.

Albert

[halfnut]

You are a lucky feller if you are having much luck with brass wire. Brazing rod is a bronze alloy, tin not zinc as an alloy with the copper. Brass will fume zinc at you when heated.

I prefer bare rod, can use as much or as little as necessary for the job. I use 20 mule team borax myself, works fine for me.

Different grades of silver solder, but generally they flow at a lower heat than bronze, stronger, and most are food grade. I braze big stuff, if fitup is good and parts are small silver solder is quick and cheap. It takes just a small bit of silversolder to make a joint, most people use way too much.

[SGW]

Check out the various types of silver solder available from Small Parts Inc. http://www.smallparts.com/
I agree with halfnut -- for small stuff, I find silver solder more convenient and easier to manage.

[docsteve66]

Agree 100 percent with half nut. I haven't seen this in a long time, but once upon a time, you could buy a "cone" of borax, use an acid brush to wipe water on it and get flux of nice thick consistancy in the tray the cone set in.

A good fresh coated braze rod works fine sometimes for me. But I prefer flux on the parent metal and dip the rod myself.

Andfor gas welds- the soft iron concrete tie wire works easy, flows easy, comes in different sizes. The big stuff for big re-bar ain't found in home depot.

[Thrud]

Steve
Cones 'o Borax - man you is old. And I miss chocolate milk more than sex.

[bspooh]

I like chicken more than sex...

brent

[docsteve66]

Thrud Sez "Cones 'o Borax - man you is old."
Dave: I HATE to quote teenagers but this fits: "takes one to know one"

Actualy I suspect the cones were off market when I was a kid. I remember seeing them used though. One cone would last a long time (years). I THINK one man I knew made his own, by filling a plugged funnel with 20 mule team,wetting it down many times to make a supersaturated solution, letting it dry (or baked it). The crust on top of borax is a problem, the cone solved the problem.

Last place I worked had its own acetylene generator using carbide. Now I can't find carbide locally. Even worse the sporting goods stores have no idea what I am speaking of, unless some past middle aged man says - oh yes, they used to usethat stuff for hunting lamps didn't they? Man knows here is getting old when his tools appear in antique shops, really old when the people stand around wondering what the tool could have been used for, really really old when (I usually just listen and say nothing unless I think the person talking realy wants to know what the tool was for) the person tirns their baby blues to me and says they can't see how THAT could ever have been a problem.

[Thrud]

Doc

What scares me is I was watching a commercial on UPN 38 - the ones with the bears and the Charmin in the woods. The said, and I quote "The new charmin will support a glass when wet but the old charmin can't hold the glass and it tears".

I don't know about you guys, but I don't take a cup into the throne room and rub it up and down in the crack of my ass with charmin on the bottom of it. Have you guys had problems with the cup rubbing through the **** tickets before?

[This message has been edited by Thrud (edited 06-15-2002).]