[TheForge] Re: Flux, was rust & pickling

[Mike Sweany]

So are you telling me that melting borax on an iron cookie will pick up some of the iron?
 
Don't some companies add iron to the flux mix anyhow?

Mike Spencer <mspencer@tallships.ca> wrote:

> Was this melted on a piece to be welded or on a cookie sheet? in
> either case could the borax have been reacting with the item it was
> on( I am assuming iron) and turned black?

One of the things you learn in Chemistry 101 is borax bead tests. You
fuse a platinum wire into a glass tube for a handle, make a little
loop in the end of the wire, heat the loop red hot and dip it in
borax. Back to the flame to melt the borax into a bead. Then you dip
the bead in your unknown stuff and heat again. The color of the
resulting contaminated bead may tell you something about your unknown.


IIRC, iron gives the bead a greenish-black color and borax I melt in
an iron ladle is greenish-black. Melting borax in glass or porcelain
shouldn't do that unless there's a contaminant in it.

Google for "borax bead test" for more details.

- Mike

-- 
Michael Spencer Nova Scotia, Canada .~. 
/V\ 
mspencer@tallships.ca /( )\
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/ ^^-^^

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