Thread: Soldering brass.

Hi,
301 Moved

May be able to help. He lives locally, (Hobart) but may respond to email or phone call .
Cheers

In my experience, thin brass is easy to solder (with a soldering iron) - except that it is an excellent conductor of heat. Preheating with a heat gun I have found helpful, a torch would work as well. The advantage of using a soldering iron is it is easier to get the solder only where you want it, which depending on what part you are soldering, may be fairly critical, if only because the solder is a different colour.

As to what solder to use - depends on what bit you are soldering, but my guess is that for most bits which have low stress on the joint, it will not be critical. If it is a previously soldered joint, I suspect that in view of its age, the original was probably traditional lead/tin solder, although today I would suggest lead free, if only from a workman's health perspective.

I use a leaded solder with silver for really thin brass. It's a Sn62Pb36Ag2 composition.

I've found a couple of really good youtube channels over the years on musical instrument repair. I have a "Smith Little" torch I use with Oxy/Propylene for a teeny pinpoint flame.

Never done a brass instrument, but I watched a lot of instrument repair videos to get a technique I use for soldering brass shim-stock.

One trick I learned is to get an old pair of socks. I soak them and wrap them either side of the bit I want to solder to stop the heat spreading too much. That and I use a 2B pencil to draw around (dirty up) the area I'm working on to stop the solder spreading too far.

Take some pics. Love to see some before and afters.

Originally Posted by BradC

I use a leaded solder with silver for really thin brass. It's a Sn62Pb36Ag2 composition.

I've found a couple of really good youtube channels over the years on musical instrument repair. I have a "Smith Little" torch I use with Oxy/Propylene for a teeny pinpoint flame.

Never done a brass instrument, but I watched a lot of instrument repair videos to get a technique I use for soldering brass shim-stock.

One trick I learned is to get an old pair of socks. I soak them and wrap them either side of the bit I want to solder to stop the heat spreading too much. That and I use a 2B pencil to draw around (dirty up) the area I'm working on to stop the solder spreading too far.

Take some pics. Love to see some before and afters.

Thanks very much for this, Err, Brad... . Especially the tip about the socks. I was wondering about some sort of thermal bandages but that's much simpler.

Oh, and there will be pics. It's the only way I will be able to put the thing back together.
I have also found a couple of channels for instrument repair. But in my case it becomes another rabbit hole to get lost in, which is why I asked here.

This guy is interesting to me, well at least this series is. Makes it approachable.

Watching with interest. I have a single barrel shotgun I want to put a front sight on. I will use a brass bush made to fit the OD then solder on the bits to make the sight. I have a little coil of silver solder but dont know if it has its own flux.(label gone) if not will have to buy one. Was going to try first, so now I will wait for your trial.

Keith

Originally Posted by 123rover50

Watching with interest. I have a single barrel shotgun I want to put a front sight on. I will use a brass bush made to fit the OD then solder on the bits to make the sight. I have a little coil of silver solder but dont know if it has its own flux.(label gone) if not will have to buy one. Was going to try first, so now I will wait for your trial.

Keith

I did that once on a little .410. Didn't trim the end inside the barrel. First shot and I had to do it again