Dears, Could you please advise me what hard soldering/brazing equipment to buy? Jewellers aren't interested in that kind of work, and I guess I'll have to do it myself. At the beginning I need to hard solder parts such as vaporizer, rapid nozzle etc. 1. Jewellery equipment of the highest shelf costs about 500$ (Smiths Little Torch Torch) and I am not willing to spend so much to use it twice a year. 2. From the lower shelf the cost would be approx. 100-200$, for example: Orca jewellery torch The Orca Torch | Shor International (ishor.com) 3. Some basic MAPP torch costs approx. 30$ - is it any good? Yongan Gas Co.,Ltd-Product (rtmyongan.com) Please let me know what you would recommend, any other ideas. I do not want to buy old kerosene blow torch because I do not want to start fettling and collecting them… All the best, Piotrek
I use a Rothenberger MAPP blowtorch. A useful accessory produces a narrower flame and comprises a burner head, a jet to suit it and a hexagon key. I use a borax-coated silver solder, which is handy to apply the flux without the need to mix and apply a borax paste. More expensive than the non-flux-coated rod, which I use to supply the bulk of the filler when the flux-coated type has applied the flux and a bit of the silver solder required. For a component likely to get red hot in use - the upper part of a stove burner for example - I use a lower silver content rod (20-30% silver) to give a joint with higher melting point filler metal. Ah, but they’re handy to have to ‘bathe’ a larger component in a broad hot flame while geting the location for the repair up to silver solder melting temperaure. Otherwise, the heat of the MAPP blowtorch is conducted away by the mass of metal, prolonging (or even preventing) the melting of the silver solder. Note too the use of fire bricks to thermally isolate the component. John
Thank you @presscall I have seen your soldering achievements, so definitely I will check this out. Piotrek
Whilst re-reading this topic and the mention of occasional extra heating for large brass components, it made me think of an old technology, TCAW (Twin Carbon-arc Welding) which is not common now. You use a gizmo that attaches to your stick welder terminals and it moves two carbon rods close together producing a flame of about 3000 deg C. I inherited it and used it recently on an Austramax burner that had a hole in the side. It heated it up very well for silver brazing. Certainly not something for most lantern small piece repairs.
A MAPP torch, flux and filler rods as John mentioned would be enough to get the job done. If you don't fancy using a kerosene blow lamp, then an LPG heating torch would also do. It'd be interesting to have a carbon-arc torch too. 3000°C is enough to melt nearly any kind of refractory material including crucibles, sand and firebrick . I have a set of oxy-acetylene welding/brazing equipment around in addition to MAPP. I have both the welding and cutting torches. In addition, there is also a set for oxy-LPG heating torch. Ok, I'm using them for other activities besides brazing classic items.
I also consider Chinese alternatives of Smiths Little Torch. Not these cheapest copies, but more expensive and reportedly good quality ones. Rothenberger stuff is quite expensive, so if I am gonna spend so much, then maybe I will reach even for Smiths Little Torch or its competition. As always it depends on the budget. TCAW - would be interesting to see it on my dinning table and my wife reaction Plenty to learn and consider. Thank You for help. Piotrek
I use a set from Castolin, that has a small propane and small oxygen bottle. I think it's the same (or roughly the same, I've had mine for over 20 years now I believe) as this one: HD CASTOLIN EUTECTIC BRAZING-GAS/LEAD WELDING-PLUMBING-ROOFING KIT C/W GAUGE | eBay (shop around as I don't know if this is the best offer) They are also sold under other brandnames, and there are smaller and bigger sets (and other brands have similar sets). I've seen kits as low as €90: Amazon.de refill: Amazon.de For precision brazing I highly recommend a set with a propane bottle and an oxygen bottle and not a MAPP torch (of course a mapp torch is the cheapest option). The first one gives a much finer, better controllable and hotter flame. Obviously if you're gonna use it all day, those small oxygen bottles aren't very economic (the 1L 110bar bottles in my kit cost about €20/piece)
I find that we often use up a tank's supply fairly quickly. As for myself, I keep 2 units of 10-litre tanks at about 150bar storage pressure. The problem is that the oxygen can only be stored in its gaseous form at room temperature. Therefore, the actual mass quantities(kg) in a cylinder is quite small. Certainly not enough to meet the combustion requirements of an equal volume of liquified propane.
Oxygen - some use oxygen concentrators which are quite available since COVID, but I do not know details.
Yes the oxygen tanks go way quicker. For that Castolin 1450 it's a bit difficult to calculate as that is a mixture of gasses (propane, butane and propylane, probably to create a hotter flame), but if you use normal propane, the amount of oxygen for 1L tank of liquified propane is as follows: C3H8 + 5 O2->3 CO2 + 4 H2O 1L propane (liquid) is 493 grams. That is about 11.2 mol (propane: ca. 44g/mol) So to burn that completely, you need about 11.2*5=56 mol of oxygen (O2). Oxygen (O2) weighs about 1,43g/L, and weighs about 32g/mol So we need 56*32=1792gram O2 to burn 1L of liquid propane. So that is 1792/1.43=1253 liters of oxygen. So if you use 150 bar tanks, you need 1253/150=8.35L. So a 10L tank will suffice for a small 1L tank of propane.
That's pretty detailed stoichiometric calculation down to the mol ! @GuidoK The Castolin is probably a MAPP-substitute or MAP-Pro. I suppose true MAPP gas is no longer produced. I don't have a 1-litre propane tank. I'm having 10-litre acetylene cylinders instead. It is cheaper at larger volumes. It isn't entirely acetylene but is absorbed in acetone for safe storage. The pressure gauge reads 20 bar when newly re-filled. Without the acetone, acetylene might decompose explosively at around 1-2 bar or anything greater.(even on its own without oxygen). For me, its either the 10-litre acetylene cylinders or a general domestic gas tank containing 14.5kg of LPG. Anything larger than those would become too inconvenient for me since I won't be able to easily load them into my small car.
Remember using the big oxy/acet bottles a general rule of thumb was 2 oxy for every acetylene but it depended on what you were doing.. most stuff was cutting and some heating.. hate to think what the hire costs alone are now from BOC..
Yes, about that or so... I'm doing those stuffs on my own, so don't have worry about the hiring costs. Unless of course, when things get beyond my skill levels, which are mediocre at best
Something tells me you didn't buy that setup to braze little defects on tilleys and petromaxes My guess is that those Castolin containers have 10% propane, 25% propylene and 65% butane. The MSDS doesn't specify. It says petroleum gasses, and has a list the gasses above with exposure limits (including LPG, which is propae/butane mix)
This was fun but very expensive to keep. The bottles went back to BOC last year. I reckon I had it close to 40 years. I hate to think how much I spent on those bottles.
yes, the hire charges out weigh everything else over time! You can buy bottles of gas for heating/welding etc under the same terms as for propane/butane etc and it works out a lot cheaper than the hire system.. might seem a lot but so handy to have especially as the hire charges went up every year..
I had to look up BOC, but I see it's a division of Linde, who also has a/the hire system here in the Netherlands. Indeed crazy expensive. My dad had it 25 years ago for his TIG welder...switched to a bought bottle argon within a year. Hired bottles are I think only interesting for large welding shops/divisions that are part of a multinational and care more for service than money.
