Brazing is a quick and inexpensive alternative to welding. The equipment in this project can be bought for as little as $30 dollars. Brazing is also much easier then welding, it's a lot like using a glue gun. Brazed metal can also be stronger then welds. And for personal projects and small production runs, brazing is much more cost effective.
In this instructable I'll show you how to fix a bicycle kickstand, make bi-metal candle sticks, show you a few examples of other things you can make. There's a lot more you can do, this is really easy and I hope this will get you started.
I think many instructable projects on this site could be simplified with this technique. Basically, with any project where you want to make something strong out of metal like aluminum or copper. A couple ways you might use this include mechanical uses like adding a foot to a bicycle kick stand, making a bicycle cart or part on a lawnmower, and uses in electronics like soldering copper to aluminum to a solar panel backing. Brazing is just great for a lot of things!
Brazing, means melting an alloy to join two metals. There are a few different brazing systems out there. My favorite is low temperature brazing using an alloy called HTS-735-II. It brazes at low temperatures and makes it easy to connect all sorts of metals and the welds aren't brittle.
Project Materials:
* Propane torch
* Low temp fluxless brazing rods (These are hard to find so I listed a couple places people can get them.)
- Alumiweld 730 rods from Harbor Freight Item #44810, they cost about $14 bucks for an 8 pack. To braze a kick stand you might use 1/4 a rod.
- You can buy pounds for around $35 a pound from alumiweld.com this is where Harbor Freight orders from.
- Or HTS-735-II welding rods can be ordered from these companies in US and a UK seller. These companies charge around $70 for a pack, so it's not the best deal though this is what I used in my projects.
* Pliers
* Protective Gloves
* File or steel wool to clean the joint surfaces.
* A brick or steel can or tray to braze on.
* Metal pieces you want to connect together like: aluminum, magnesium, zinc, brass, copper...
Note:
* Not for food grade applications. Having called the manufacturer of the Alumiweld product, they said they are not selling a food safe product yet, though they will be. So I'll update this instructable when they do. But with the current product I wouldn't let the product have prolonged contact with skin or food since I don't think it's designed for that.
If you do want to join pipes for food applications here is an easy to use product for that purpose:
#450 Soft Silver Solder
96.5% Tin / 3.5% Silver
Melting Point: 430° F
"Use: Ideal for electrical work, utensils, and dairy and food equipment."
http://www.aladdin3in1.com/catalog5.htm
FAQs:
* There are two methods I use for welds, melt and blob methods. Both are described in their own section.
* I use the term "welded" instead "brazed" a lot for a few reasons. First it's common language and people who are starting out with this will be confused by technobabble. The Second, I use the term "welded" because that's how the product I use describes itself.
* This is low temperature so there aren't a lot of fumes or uv light dangers. I often use this indoors, though a garage with good ventilation is probably recommended.
* The weld point tends to be stronger then the base metal, if the metal is aluminum or copper. So you can fill in gaps like dents in propellers and holes or cracks.
* The alloy I'm using here can be used at sea, it won't disintegrate from electrical differences. So you can fix propellers and things with this.
* Making an odd sized nut. Because this alloy does not stick to iron or steel screws, you can melt it onto an aluminum or brass washer and build it up around the threads. Then give it a twist with a wrench, it comes free and you have a nut.
* Making bushings or custom threaded screw holes. This is also usually hard to do. But if you have a piece of steel you can put in a hole and you fill around the hole with this stuff, this alloy won't stick to the steel so when you take out the screw you had in the hole you will have a it will make a threaded screw hole. If you used a smooth steel bolt then you will have a close fitting bushing. Though the hole will be tight so you may need to sand it if you want to use it as a bushing.
* FYI I don't sell this welding product and I'm not associated with the companies that do. This technique is just cheap, easy and awesome! Enjoy!
In this instructable I'll show you how to fix a bicycle kickstand, make bi-metal candle sticks, show you a few examples of other things you can make. There's a lot more you can do, this is really easy and I hope this will get you started.
I think many instructable projects on this site could be simplified with this technique. Basically, with any project where you want to make something strong out of metal like aluminum or copper. A couple ways you might use this include mechanical uses like adding a foot to a bicycle kick stand, making a bicycle cart or part on a lawnmower, and uses in electronics like soldering copper to aluminum to a solar panel backing. Brazing is just great for a lot of things!
Brazing, means melting an alloy to join two metals. There are a few different brazing systems out there. My favorite is low temperature brazing using an alloy called HTS-735-II. It brazes at low temperatures and makes it easy to connect all sorts of metals and the welds aren't brittle.
Project Materials:
* Propane torch
* Low temp fluxless brazing rods (These are hard to find so I listed a couple places people can get them.)
- Alumiweld 730 rods from Harbor Freight Item #44810, they cost about $14 bucks for an 8 pack. To braze a kick stand you might use 1/4 a rod.
- You can buy pounds for around $35 a pound from alumiweld.com this is where Harbor Freight orders from.
- Or HTS-735-II welding rods can be ordered from these companies in US and a UK seller. These companies charge around $70 for a pack, so it's not the best deal though this is what I used in my projects.
* Pliers
* Protective Gloves
* File or steel wool to clean the joint surfaces.
* A brick or steel can or tray to braze on.
* Metal pieces you want to connect together like: aluminum, magnesium, zinc, brass, copper...
Note:
* Not for food grade applications. Having called the manufacturer of the Alumiweld product, they said they are not selling a food safe product yet, though they will be. So I'll update this instructable when they do. But with the current product I wouldn't let the product have prolonged contact with skin or food since I don't think it's designed for that.
If you do want to join pipes for food applications here is an easy to use product for that purpose:
#450 Soft Silver Solder
96.5% Tin / 3.5% Silver
Melting Point: 430° F
"Use: Ideal for electrical work, utensils, and dairy and food equipment."
http://www.aladdin3in1.com/catalog5.htm
FAQs:
* There are two methods I use for welds, melt and blob methods. Both are described in their own section.
* I use the term "welded" instead "brazed" a lot for a few reasons. First it's common language and people who are starting out with this will be confused by technobabble. The Second, I use the term "welded" because that's how the product I use describes itself.
* This is low temperature so there aren't a lot of fumes or uv light dangers. I often use this indoors, though a garage with good ventilation is probably recommended.
* The weld point tends to be stronger then the base metal, if the metal is aluminum or copper. So you can fill in gaps like dents in propellers and holes or cracks.
* The alloy I'm using here can be used at sea, it won't disintegrate from electrical differences. So you can fix propellers and things with this.
* Making an odd sized nut. Because this alloy does not stick to iron or steel screws, you can melt it onto an aluminum or brass washer and build it up around the threads. Then give it a twist with a wrench, it comes free and you have a nut.
* Making bushings or custom threaded screw holes. This is also usually hard to do. But if you have a piece of steel you can put in a hole and you fill around the hole with this stuff, this alloy won't stick to the steel so when you take out the screw you had in the hole you will have a it will make a threaded screw hole. If you used a smooth steel bolt then you will have a close fitting bushing. Though the hole will be tight so you may need to sand it if you want to use it as a bushing.
* FYI I don't sell this welding product and I'm not associated with the companies that do. This technique is just cheap, easy and awesome! Enjoy!
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Signing UpStep 1: Melt brazing - Making candle sticks
My first weld type I will describe here is typical "Melt Brazing". It's just heating the metal then touching the metal with the brazing rod to see if the rod starts melting everything together. In this example I'm making some candlesticks welding copper to aluminum. Typically that would be very difficult to do, but with this system it's very easy.
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Never use plumber tin as many times it contains lead.
You probably want to use a food safe solder for that like "450 Soft Silver Solder". I wrote you with some more details...
Clean your weld area with a stainless steel brush that you only clean aluminum with.
Clean your welding rod with garnet paper or something that isn't oxide based. Plain sandpaper is aluminum oxide so it is no good. Plain Steel wool is no good either as it has carbon in it that may lead to weld contamination.
Get back to me and let me know what if any differences you see. I'm going to bet on night and day ...
So I think you're being old fashioned. I can TIG weld in the shop, but I can also keep welding tools in my toolbox , fix parts right on the dock, you can't. I can also work with fine jewellery size parts and thin metals that you can't. Your methods are limited. But to each his own.
I guess you never saw this:
(390 °C)
All the other stuff have similar composition, there is no brevet as it has been used for more than 80 years. Warning: it's a soldering/brazing rod, not a welding. Do not use it for structural purposes, and it's not resistant to corrosion (salt water etc...).
Also for joining copper to aluminum; tin 95-5 antimony, and tin 96-4 silver can be used also, and it's food grade. For some applications in corrosive medium it's better as the tin is almost impervious to corrosion. Melts at 225° C. Fluxes required.
On many occasions, I have wanted to join metals without using screws.
But I thought it would require a much more complicated traditional welding process. This opens up many more avenues for making things!
I'll be running to Harbor Freight this weekend.
Excellent 'ible' though, this will come in very useful for aluminium work I have to do.
Kevan
eBay has the best price by far, sadly i found this out after i had bought from the official dealer
Unless, that is, I can get set up with aluminium welding on my mig welder.... I ought to have done an Instructable about this I suppose as I've just fitted a Euro torch socket to it.
What do you call structural? I would not use zinc alloys on structural works where a failure would be catastrophic. The adhesion (if no flux is used) is rather impredictable and zinc itself is a source of worries with galvanic corrosion, specially when in contact with copper or its alloys.
For example on frigorific works tin-silver is preferred. A zinc join would not be reliable because of the possibility of stray currents.
Regarding structural capabilities, it can be used for repairing engine casings which require significant structural strength and vibration resistance. It is used for repairing propellers as well. In my experience working with it, it seems fit for use for structural components such as connecting supportive pipes/bars. Now if it was pure melted zinc, then I would agree that wouldn't work. But the alloy seems to work much better then pure zinc, which I use regularly for metal casting.
Alumiweld (whatever they claim), Aladdin 3, Welco 52 and all that stuff are made basically of an alloy of zinc at 96-97 %, aluminium around 3% and a bit of copper and other metals. This alloy has been known for more than 80 years.
The best proof is all that stuff melt at the same temperature; 490° C, have the same use and solder the same metals. There are no miracles in joining metals.
Whatever the -small- variants in composition it's basically zinc with an electrical potential lower than aluminium. Briefly an anode in case of electro-galvanic corrosion.
The lone true fixing on aluminium propellers and casings is welding mainly with a 4043 or 4047 alloy, but the zinc alloy works in most cases as most of these repairs are not structural (a hole in a casing does not affect its structural integrity, a long crack yes and in this case you have to weld), and are made on not highly stressed small structures.
The great advantage of zinc alloy is the low temp, so it requires a simple torch. The inconveniences are corrosion and sometimes resistance at long term.
The stress performances are not sufficient and reliable enough for structural purposes. By structural I mean a joint able to withstand the stresses, vibration cycles, and corrosion effects of a structure stressed at the maximum possible. You'll never see zinc alloy joints on aluminium boats, planes and even race bicycles.
I almost forgot: 490° C is enough to temper (=soften) heat treatable aluminiums like the 6061. (have you remarked that industrial aluminium ladders are never welded ?)
Anyway I've had some great experiences with Alumniweld and I would recommend it for all sorts of projects. Some more great project ideas:
* Building a light metal frame for a robot
* Building a metal frame for a picture
* Build a roof rack
* Make metal green house shelves
* Make an angled plant hanger
* Make metal toy boats
* Build a fishtank or speaker support.
* Fix a lawn mower wheel bearings or bolts
* Build a small engine support
And "yes" it is a miracle to make basic repairs without spending thousands of dollars and hours of training on the equipment.
All that I wanted to point that zinc alloys cannot be used in stressed structures where a failure could have catastrophic consequences like on a mountain bike, a ladder, or inside an engine. That bothers me to read impossible claims or to see videos of the kind of a guy fixing a crack between the two valves of a car engine...it's simply outside the possibilities of zinc alloy soldering.
Also some prices are simply...let's say puzzling: the Welco 52 can be bought at 10.05 USD a pound...
I saw something very similar to this product at Sandown Engineering Exhibition December 2010.
The guy will probably be at Alaxandra Palace Engineering Exhibition from fri-Sun 21-23 Jan 2011.
Sorry I don't recall the name of the product
Jack
You should be able to order a cheap 8 pack of rods from Harbor Freight for like 15 dollars plus shipping. Harbor Freight also gave me their international orders number (805)388-3000.
For the exact product I used in this instructable, you would order from these people in the US or here for the UK.
And FYI, I'm not associated with either of these companies.
Thank you and have a great new year.
Kevan