Member postings for BW

I saw mention of Cadmium in posts above.

In Australia I recently bought some Silver Solder rods with Cadmiuim, seems to be easily available in shops.

Did my first silver soldering and quite chuffed with results, however am aware that some people appear to be very wary of Cadmium whilst others are not so concerned.

Any good risk assessment worksheets associated with Cadmium bearing solders that you chaps can recommend ?

If I am in a well ventilated space and use the solder for less than 30 minutes a week doing very small occassional jobs ( ie tiny little wobblers and boilers less than 1 cubic inch of material being heated and soldered surfaces of less than 0.5 sq inches) - how do I calculate my exposure and associated risk ?

Bill

Baking section at Tescos, Sainsburys, Woolworths, Foodland, Safeway etc etc will usually have citric acid in powder form. Quite cheap.

Worked for me until I got an old electric hacksaw.

Bill

I just stumbled across these concepts today.

Looks fascinating and may be of interest to some of you.

The basic ideas have neen around since the 1930s the heat engine aspect doesn't seem to be commercially developed/exploited yet.

Google will find lots of interesting things if you have a look

**LINK**

**LINK**

Bill

Bill

Thanks for all the tips.

Am getting there, had another go today and managed a lot better.

Bill

Thanks for the help and the comments. Will try a different flux and placing the workpiece in a corner as suggested by Jason. Will look for some of that Woolly stuff that George uses as well.

When you chaps are soldering something as small as the M3 threaded socket in my photos would you still use a bigger torch than mine ?

I guess you don't bother trying to focus on one small part in one location just wash the whole surface with flame. Gotta admit I was hoping to be able to learn by doing small workpieces with my small torch before splashing out on a big one.

Just noticed that the solder ran into the steam outlet hole and completely blocked it, I guess thats a rite of passage that all soldering novices have to experience ....... will buy a bottle of tippex.

Bill

Jason Fixed it - this post redundant.

Edited By BW on 16/04/2019 10:50:40

Hello,

Following some encouragement on another thread I had a go at Silver Soldering today. I think the end results are okay, but I had to totally clean and redo some joints 3x due to flux turning to a black charred mess before the copper was up to temperature. Flux is Easyflo. Solder is SBA 245 with a soupcon of Cadmium. Torch is average handyman small general purpose and is shown in one of the photos.

When it works I don't know what I did right and when it doesn't work I don't know what I did wrong ..... Is it a bit like using a parting tool ? One day you go to the shed and realise you can do it and its not a problem any more ?

Sometimes it is easy to indirectly heat the flux from the other side of the joint, but depending upon workpiece size and geometry sometimes the flame has to play directly upon the flux, that's when I seem to have more problems.

Would value any comments / recommended reading / websites etc please.

Its a Jenny Wren boiler from Tubal Cain book "Building Simple Model Steam Engines"

Photos here

...... and yes the flue is crooked ..... decided to press on with all mistakes included and get maximum learning from first attempt ..... will repeat from the start and do a better one.

Bill

Edited By JasonB on 16/04/2019 10:35:46

Edited By BW on 16/04/2019 10:45:37

Edited By BW on 16/04/2019 10:50:00

What is the logic and maths behind the 78 degrees please ?

Bill

Had a look cannot find it. Must have seen it on another machine. Tried Google history as well.

Bill

Deleted : Please Ignore

Edited By BW on 29/03/2019 10:33:03

Edited By BW on 29/03/2019 10:33:28

Thanks,

Sounds like a non-starter then.

Still cannot find the video - similar to this one (THIS ONE)

But done by a bloke in a shed on a small lathe with a single hand tool and he completely closed the end over.

He had approx 1" of open pipe copper sticking out of the chuck when he started

Bill

Oh yes, !!!!, speaking of boiler ends has anybody ever done this ? Oh bother, cannot find the video now.

Imagine closing the end of a copper pipe by spinning/form rolling the last couple of centimetres through 90 degrees (depends upon pipe diameter ) then all you have to do is solder up the tiny hole in the middle.

Saw a chap doing this on youtube a few days ago, don't know what the final product was going to be, was googling form rolling / roll forming and stumbled across it. Cannot find it in my history.

Would that be a viable way of closing a boiler end ?

Some fairly interesting videos on youtube but cannot find the specific one that I'm talking about.

Bill

Thanks for the answers, didnt realise it was used like that in industry, will have a look for a few videos on google.

Looking doubtful that us common shed dwellers will ever be using induction to solder up our boiler ends in the near future .....

This LINK shows all forum threads containing the word induction

Some interesting bits and pieces there.

This LINK goes to a recent Tutorial I saw regarding making an induction heater.

I get the impression that although people have been interested in using these things for heating up bits of metal in the workshop the technique is limited to melting stuff and heating bearings.

It has never been regarded as useful for soldering and brazing, Is that still the case ? Has anybody recently used these gadgets to solder or braze or are gas torches still the main tool.

Bill

Thanks Jason.

Got it now.

Bill

Why do people want to split a bearing and then solder it back together again ? WHat is the improvement that is gained by doing this ?

Bill

Thanks Niko,

Have sent in a price inquiry will post results

Bill

I emailed Lukas.

None in stock.

No Australian distributors

Minimum order 50 pieces @ €150 per piece and will manufacture to your drawings.

Well, that was all very interesting, am not going to rush out and buy any.

Bill

Hopper gave a great list of accessories in post #3

Worth another look at that list, you can often get tools/accessories included with the main machine when buying second hand, you may not realise it but you can easily spend as much on tools as on the machines so getting second hand tools as a bulk buy with your lathe/mill is worth considering. I have been very lucky in that respect.

Bill