Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

I've not welded copper before but ive read that its simmilar to aluminum, so i want to ask what type of filler rod do you all use for a copper still?

I'm not sure what you are supposed to use, but I've had total success using tig and silver braze for copper to copper and also copper to brass :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Can't say I've ever Tig welded copper. Most of the guys here (including myself) silver solder - often referred to as "hard soldering" (for joints requiring strength) and soft solder (must be lead free solder too) for other joints. Cheers.

Lowie wrote:Can't say I've ever Tig welded copper. Most of the guys here (including myself) silver solder - often referred to as "hard soldering" (for joints requiring strength) and soft solder (must be lead free solder too) for other joints. Cheers.

Myself being a tig welder for a living and having a tig at home,find that the tigged silver brazed welds to be much neater and have a lot more control and reinforcement than when brazing. Is also great for tacking up joints, to keep them square in preparation for soft soldering :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Now you're just showing off Bayshine :teasing-neener:

Do you run helium as a sheilding gas like they suggest bayshine?

Also clean copper wire can be used.

According to the book, use helium or Avon helium
Mix and use purge has or backing, but like everything horses for courses, silicone bronze filler and pure argon will come up nice as well

When I tig welded my bubbler I just used polished up copper wire as the filler and found one needs heaps of amps to get the pool flowing.

bayshine wrote:Myself being a tig welder for a living and having a tig at home,find that the tigged silver brazed welds to be much neater and have a lot more control and reinforcement than when brazing. Is also great for tacking up joints, to keep them square in preparation for soft soldering :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Ah cool thanks for the info bayshine. Do you weld it in AC or DC?

With the silver braze and copper and or brass, just use a flap disc to clean all surfaces to be welded
I just use argon and definitely no flux
You don't need to melt the copper and or brass (parent metal)into the weld pool,like with normal tig, but just feed the silver braze wire Into the arc around what ever you want to glue together, it has a low melting point and beads up nice and fast :handgestures-thumbupleft:
I have found straight butt joints welded in pipe and then ground flush to still have great strength and not fail.
You can get the odd pin hole from time to time but these are easily fixed up with the tig :happy-partydance:




Oh and only tried it on dc, can't imagine ac working to well :handgestures-thumbupleft:

i had a go at TIGing some copper on an element guard the other day. Went well, using an AC tig and pure argon. I found that I had to lean the torch over on a larger angle and push the pool along, otherwise the pool would start bubbling and spitting. Used some copper wire from some electrical cable to fill where needed, but mainly just fused the parent metals together.



Ash

bayshine wrote:

Lowie wrote:Can't say I've ever Tig welded copper. Most of the guys here (including myself) silver solder - often referred to as "hard soldering" (for joints requiring strength) and soft solder (must be lead free solder too) for other joints. Cheers.

Myself being a tig welder for a living and having a tig at home,find that the tigged silver brazed welds to be much neater and have a lot more control and reinforcement than when brazing. Is also great for tacking up joints, to keep them square in preparation for soft soldering :handgestures-thumbupleft:

So, Bayshine, you're using the standard silver solder stick to tig weld copper? If that's the case, I might give it a bash next time I make some easy flanges. I go through a shit load of oxy usually so keen to try something different. I've got a scratch start tig which I use for stainless.

Lowie wrote:

bayshine wrote:

Lowie wrote:Can't say I've ever Tig welded copper. Most of the guys here (including myself) silver solder - often referred to as "hard soldering" (for joints requiring strength) and soft solder (must be lead free solder too) for other joints. Cheers.

Myself being a tig welder for a living and having a tig at home,find that the tigged silver brazed welds to be much neater and have a lot more control and reinforcement than when brazing. Is also great for tacking up joints, to keep them square in preparation for soft soldering :handgestures-thumbupleft:

So, Bayshine, you're using the standard silver solder stick to tig weld copper? If that's the case, I might give it a bash next time I make some easy flanges. I go through a shit load of oxy usually so keen to try something different. I've got a scratch start tig which I use for stainless.

Ah well if its silver solder, I wonder if the different percentages make any difference? or would it not due to the higher heat of the arc...?

rash wrote:i had a go at TIGing some copper on an element guard the other day. Went well, using an AC tig and pure argon. I found that I had to lean the torch over on a larger angle and push the pool along, otherwise the pool would start bubbling and spitting. Used some copper wire from some electrical cable to fill where needed, but mainly just fused the parent metals together.

eg1.jpg

Ash

ah nice to hear. :handgestures-thumbupleft:
What amperage did you run it at?

scottyd72 wrote:

rash wrote:i had a go at TIGing some copper on an element guard the other day. Went well, using an AC tig and pure argon. I found that I had to lean the torch over on a larger angle and push the pool along, otherwise the pool would start bubbling and spitting. Used some copper wire from some electrical cable to fill where needed, but mainly just fused the parent metals together.

eg1.jpg

Ash

ah nice to hear. :handgestures-thumbupleft:
What amperage did you run it at?

Pretty sure i had it at around 50amps.
Ash

I wasn't using silver solder, but was silver braze :handgestures-thumbupleft:
The stuff that work had lent me(cough) was called silbraze cadmium free but I can't remember which one as they have a couple with different silver content :think:

bayshine wrote:I wasn't using silver solder, but was silver braze :handgestures-thumbupleft:
The stuff that work had lent me(cough) was called silbraze cadmium free but I can't remember which one as they have a couple with different silver content :think:

Roger. Love it when your boss lends you stuff, particularly when it's not a boomerang! :handgestures-thumbupleft:

bayshine wrote:I wasn't using silver solder, but was silver braze :handgestures-thumbupleft:
The stuff that work had lent me(cough) was called silbraze cadmium free but I can't remember which one as they have a couple with different silver content :think:

Oh nice, I was watching a utube vid by weld.com onTIG Brazing and 'Mr Tig' was using silicone bronze rods for tig brazing copper to SS.

If you want to have a crack at tig welding mate, have a look at the inverter welders (essentialy an arc welder that you convert to a tig), they are scratch start but once you get the hang of them, piece of piss. That's what I use anyway. Most expensive part is the gas...

Lowie wrote:If you want to have a crack at tig welding mate, have a look at the inverter welders (essentialy an arc welder that you convert to a tig), they are scratch start but once you get the hang of them, piece of piss. That's what I use anyway. Most expensive part is the gas...

Yep ta, i plan on buying a cigweld DC inverter 180amp scratch tig machine this weekend. Sydney tools have them for a reasonable price for what i can find.