Tweet
You've all seen the guy with the booth at the local swapmeet, demonstrating one or other brand of low-temp pre-fluxed aluminum and/or pot-metal "repair" rod that's applied via an air/propane torch. Often the demonstrator uses aluminum soda cans, since the nearly pure aluminum in them "tins" easily. A couple of times I have bought the minimum number of rods, and found that whether with a propane torch or with oxy-acetylene at very low pressures, these rods do work well on the soda cans but seem not to do so well on other aluminum alloys. Maybe I just haven't found the good combination.
Does anyone here work regularly, even professionally, with low-temp aluminum rod? I'd like to find a rod, and a technique, that "tins" well (given well-cleaned base metal, of course) and will draw itself well into crevices (say .003-.008") by capillary action as with ordinary bronze welding on steel. As to your specific favorite brand of rod, I want it for aluminum, not pot-metal, which I expect might call for a rod with a lot more zinc. If this brand is not pre-fluxed, or even if it is, whose flux do you like? Do you pre-flux, or even pre-tin the pieces where you want the filler to draw itself in? Also, while I don't currently own an air-acetylene torch, I could get one if that's the way to go. Or I suppose I could get a little bottle of hydrogen, if you prefer oxy-hydrogen, as the old-timers did for gas-WELDING aluminum.
(If it's not fully clear, I'm NOT asking about gas-WELDING aluminum, but the low-temp process, . . . although, just as a comment, for anybody who has tried gas-WELDING aluminum in school years ago, you might not know that you now can get gas-welding rod that is pre-fluxed!! With all of the cleaning and prep that aluminum requires, I thought it was a drag to also have to clean the ROD, heat it up, and tediously brush on the flux (which you had to mix with water) and wait for it to dry. The pre-fluxed rod is great!)
Does anyone here work regularly, even professionally, with low-temp aluminum rod? I'd like to find a rod, and a technique, that "tins" well (given well-cleaned base metal, of course) and will draw itself well into crevices (say .003-.008") by capillary action as with ordinary bronze welding on steel. As to your specific favorite brand of rod, I want it for aluminum, not pot-metal, which I expect might call for a rod with a lot more zinc. If this brand is not pre-fluxed, or even if it is, whose flux do you like? Do you pre-flux, or even pre-tin the pieces where you want the filler to draw itself in? Also, while I don't currently own an air-acetylene torch, I could get one if that's the way to go. Or I suppose I could get a little bottle of hydrogen, if you prefer oxy-hydrogen, as the old-timers did for gas-WELDING aluminum.
(If it's not fully clear, I'm NOT asking about gas-WELDING aluminum, but the low-temp process, . . . although, just as a comment, for anybody who has tried gas-WELDING aluminum in school years ago, you might not know that you now can get gas-welding rod that is pre-fluxed!! With all of the cleaning and prep that aluminum requires, I thought it was a drag to also have to clean the ROD, heat it up, and tediously brush on the flux (which you had to mix with water) and wait for it to dry. The pre-fluxed rod is great!)
Comment