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> how do you compensate for the tubing spreading open as the
> metal expands while you are trying to solder the seam ?
This can be a real problem. As well, some metals (white golds,
for example) can spring open during drawing, so you never get a
drawn seam that's quite close enough. the answer is to draw a
tube to slightly larger than your desired size, and then solder
the seam. While heating to above annealing temp, the seam can be
gently coaxed closed again with tweezers, soldering the seam in
small sections. Then, after soldering and some clean up of the
seam, the final drawing gets everything round again and
eliminates the evidence of the soldering operation. With softer
metals, though, like higher carat golds or fine silver, it's
usually not a problem in the first place. Anneal the tube one
draw before you intend to solder it, so it's being soldered after
being drawn only one step through the plate. If your gentle, it
will usually just stay closed. You can also prepare such tubes
(with seams that start out looking good but which you fear will
spread open) prior to soldering with binding wire to hold it
shut, but this is a bit of a pain, since you must do it so the
wire bridges the seam without touching it, or the solder will
adhere the binding wire to the tube when it runs down the seam.
Avoiding that is certainly possible, but takes more time than
simply adjusting while soldering if needed, with a pair of
tweezer to squeeze things shut again. Sound's less neat and
slick and professional and all, but it gets the job done with the
least effort and bother.
> how do you keep the tubing from opening up again during
> another soldering operation - especially if it's a soldering
> operation that's going to go into an enamelled piece and you
> are therefore using IT for that as well?
You've drawn the tube at least once after soldering, and
annealed it as well. If you did both carefully, and then pay
attention to where the seam is placed in assembly, the tube won't
open. You soldered the seam with hard or IT solder, so by the
time that solder might flow again, the tube is well past
annealing temps, and has no spring in it to open it up again.
Also, if you used only a minimum amount of solder in the first
place, it will remelt again at a slightly higher temp than it
originally flowed at, so if you're careful, you can put entire
pieces together with just IT solder, without things flowing
unduly. Part of the key here is clean tight seams without excess
solder. And by being careful where the seam is, if any solder
does flow again, see to it that it's at the place where the tube
is being joined to other parts, so a little solder flow makes no
difference. And finally, don't forget yellow ocher or similar
stuff when needed. A coating of the stuff, while messy, does
slightly insulate what's underneath, in addition to preventing
solder from flowing farther than it already did. So you can
often keep the solder on previous joins from getting quite hot
enough to flow at all.
Hope this helps.
Peter Rowe
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