Soldering brass

[John Pol]

Hi all would like to learn how to solder brass.And what do you guys use for your heating source.Do you guys use a torch or a solder iron.And what do you use to put under the brass so it don`t burn the table.And how do you hold the part to get solder and what do you use to cut your sheets or tubbing.And when you solder one end how do perfent the other end from coming loose.because if you solder one end don`t get the whole tube hot.Any help would be great I just thought if I could learn this it mit open more doors for me to get more interested and model building.

John Pol

[CAL]

Hi all would like to learn how to solder brass.And what do you guys use for your heating source.Do you guys use a torch or a solder iron.And what do you use to put under the brass so it don`t burn the table.And how do you hold the part to get solder and what do you use to cut your sheets or tubbing.And when you solder one end how do perfent the other end from coming loose.because if you solder one end don`t get the whole tube hot.Any help would be great I just thought if I could learn this it mit open more doors for me to get more interested and model building.

John Pol

Torch and silver solder

[MikeMc]

It took me almost two years learning to solder , from torch to resistance irons. What your best choice is to find a good soldering video for wiring. Once you learn how to heat flux and flow, you can move on to double joints and heat sinking....it is easy..just takes a little time

[glenn]

plenty of videos on you tube will get you started and learning how to do it.

[Mike Kucaba]

... and there are plenty of books on the subject too.Get a little background on the subject,then ask some specific questions on tasks you are having problems with.

[jbwelda]

everybodys right, check out youtube and youll get a good idea to start with. here are a couple answers to some of your more tricky questions:

>what do you guys use for your heating source.Do you guys use a torch or a solder iron.

well i use a soldering iron. but theres something to know that relates to another of your questions:

>when you solder one end how do perfent the other end from coming loose.because if you solder one end don`t get the whole tube hot.

yes that is the problem alright. the thing you need is the proper soldering iron, and typically that means kind of a big one, or one of those "guns" rather than a smaller iron type. the reason this is so is that you want to get the joint youre working on hot, but not have to hold the iron there long enough to warm up the whole tube, thereby loosening prior solder joints. so you want to have a hot iron, touch it to the joint, let your solder flow, and then remove the heat as soon as possible. this is a trick i took a long time to learn and it caused me a lot of pain, but once i realized i needed a bigger wattage iron and used this technique, things got a lot easier. you can also buy heat sink clips that you use to isolate the joint youre working on from adjacent work, but still if you have to hold the iron to the metal too long, the heat will get around the sink.

>And what do you use to put under the brass so it don`t burn the table.

thats simple: a piece of wood works well, then you can use nails or tacks or whatever to make little jigs to hold parts in place while soldering.

>what do you use to cut your sheets or tubbing.

i guess for sheets you need to scribe it a xacto knife and then either bend to break or saw with a razor saw.

for tubing though you can buy a small tube cutter for a couple bucks from for instance micro mark.

have fun with it and practice first on some scrap, but once you get a hang for it its a great skill to have.