leaking solder joint

[dazzlerpalmer]

I made an earlier post regarding the problems I was having with leaking Yorkshires.

It turns out I was using lead free solder. Very Tricky.

My neighbour has just given me some lead solder and I just touch it on the fitting and bingo. Bright silver ring.

The problem I have is this. Can I identify all the leaking joint and ust re-heat them and apply the lead solder. Actually breaking the joint will be really difficult in most places.

Can I make the repairs in siutu?

Thanks

 

[chrishutt]

Probably not.

Within the joint there will be areas of tube and/or fitting which are not "tinned" (coated with solder). These areas need cleaning and fluxing, which you cannot do from outside.

Having said that you might be lucky with some self-cleaning flux if it can get drawn into the dodgy parts of the joint.

It's usually simplest to cut out the bad joint, including pipe ends, and redo with new fittings. Of course this will mean using some straight connectors to restore the tube lengths, but it's still easier.

 

[ChrisR]

It's worth doing a bit of reeesearch with your soldering. I used to do a lot of pulling joints apart to see what had happenned. Using a blob of Laco, I found that re-soldered joints do look OK if pulled apart. As ChrisH says, Powerflow or everflux would be more aggressive.

Yorkshires use lead free solder. Leaded solder melts at a lower temperature, but unleaded "tins" better, (as it's nearly all tin) and more importantly it always forms a radius in a corner, which leaded hardly does at all.. Often you don't therefore see a bright ring round a leaded joint, so you can't see if it's good or not. But you always get a bright ring around an unleaded solder joint. If you can see the solder "suck in" and then leave a ring all round, you know the joint's OK.

I used to dislike unleaded, but now it's all I use, and I know a couple of guys who have made the same decisions.

 

[Nige F]

Anything to do with potable water regs " May your ring be forever bright"

 

[Paul Barker]

I'd be investigating what went wrong in the first place dazlepalmer. Get your technique right before you can fix it. Lead free solder takes a little longer to flow but then flows very swiftly, I imagine you didn't get the joint hot enough, implying you have a pathetic blow torch. We're all using excellent blow torches, a bad workman blames his tools but a good one knows what tools get the job done right.