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How to Sweat Solder a brass/copper pipe and couplings

video How to Sweat Solder a brass/copper pipe and couplings

Sometimes you just have to fix plumbing yourself. I recommend that you always hire a licensed plumber for all jobs, but if you want to learn how to solder copper tubing, for projects, in the home, or for repair, here is how you do it

8 comments

Jul 25, 2010. 8:39 PMairsofter1 says:

(removed by author or community request)

Jul 26, 2010. 7:54 AMbmerritt5 (author) says:

Thank you for adding nothing positive to the overall feedback for others interested in learning.

Jul 26, 2010. 12:57 PMairsofter1 says:

I am sorry if my comment offended you, I was just saying something. This is a good instructable and it did help me.

Oct 7, 2008. 9:07 AMgloflyer says:

I am not quite sure why you put this up. The title says brass, and you used copper. There are already fairly good instructables here on sweating copper.

May 8, 2010. 11:34 AM

onrust says:

I think he is spreading the use of the video link for advertisement $$.

Oct 7, 2008. 11:02 AMbmerritt5 (author) says:

Sweating brass and copper is the same technique. Good catch though, I will have to change that in the title.

Oct 10, 2008. 8:18 AM

dragonvpm says:

You forgot to mention cleaning the pipe and inside of the fitting (with emory cloth, sandpaper, cleaning tool) before you try soldering. That's an important step for any soldering job you do and it's a good habit to get into even with relatively new (i.e. shiny) pipe (and it's critical if you're soldering older pipe like you might find in a house.

If you don't do this, there's a fairly high probability that the soldered joint can fail due to contaminants (dirt, grime, corrosion, etc..) on the pipe or the fitting. Even new pipe and fittings can have come into contact with something that will adversely affect the solder's ability to bond to the metals.

Also, soldering paste is often referred to as flux (just a useful point in case someone comes across the term in regards to soldering).

Oct 16, 2008. 7:01 AMbmerritt5 (author) says:

Excellent points! I ususally just use the deburr tool to scrub the outside and inside of the pipe. It does need to be nice and shiny and clean to really solder together well - thank you for pointing that out.