Sweating Copper/Brass

W5FL · Jul 3, 2000

Jim, just get screw ends for the copper. Sweat them on and screw them into the valve. If you have a union, it is easy, if not use a copper coupling. Propane torches are normally pretty marginal on heat for sweating copper. Guess you cleaned them and used flux.

JimBinMI · Jul 3, 2000

Wen,

You're the second or third person that said that propane torches are marginal on copper, so I must be one heck of an amateur solderer because I soldered 15-20 spots on 1" copper with no problem at all! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

The problem is the brass valve and I think that Gordon hit the nail on the head, big heat sink and not enough heat. Should have told the guy at the plumbing store that I was an amateur and that I was using propane to get some pointers. Already bought the brass valve with sweat ends.
Might take it to my co-worker, the welding teacher and have him sweat in two pieces of one inch copper, then I can sweat those in place with the propane torch.

Thanks everyone for all of the responses, I knew that the knowledge here would be helpful! /w3tcompact/icons/cool.gif

JimBinMI

We boys and our toys!