[TheForge] Brass/Bronze brazing question

[Andy Vida]

PlumDon at aol.com wrote:
> 
> Morning, Andy, et al
> 
> Kindest thanks for your suggestions re repairing the weather vane. I will
> follow them to the letter.
> 
> Couple questions, if you dont mind and I thought I would respond to the list
> in case some others might also be interested in the answers
> 
> When you say 'finely divide', I take it you mean just clip off tiny snips of
> the silver solder from the sheet, mix them in with the borax flux and coat the
> joint?

	You can do it that way, but I was referring to taking a fine
	file and filing the solder into as fine a pweder as possible.
	You don't have to go nuts on it, but the finer the better.
> 
> What acid is good for pickling (cleaning up) the flux? I solder some other
> items also, and have trouble getting them clean of flux and they rust up on me.
> I would be interested in a pickle that would work well on steel and brass.

	For bronze, probably #2 Sparex.
> 
> I have been using Rio Ready Flux from Rio Grande for silver solder flux. Do
> you have any experience with that...good or bad?

	No idea.  If it is borax, it is fine.  I'm not a big fan of
	Fluoride fluxes.

> For basic soft soldering I
> have had poor results with several fluxes (especially the craftsman stuff from
> Sears) until I started using Stay Clean. I use it with those little 60/40
> pellets, also from Rio Grande, and get really excellent results.

	Then use that if you are going to soft solder the plates on.
> 
> Thanks again for the help

	My pleasure