Hi! I’ve been a bench jeweler for 3 years for Walmart. We use natural gas in the shop and I have no issues with my smith little torch. I’ve recently invested in a home setup to begin making my own rings and I’ve chosen to start out with 925.
For my home setup, it was recommended to me to use an oxy/acetylene setup. I’m using the smith little torch with a size 5 tip. My psi is set to 10 on the oxygen and 4 on acetylene. Here’s my issue: if my torch is set to ball up my solder, it will not flow on my silver to save my life, my flux doesn’t really bubble up, and my ring turns black. But if I crank up the heat a bit, my solder and my ring turns black but it will flow. I’m worried when I start making prongs I won’t be able to polish out all of the oxidation in the small crevices.
I assumed there would be a learning curve going from natural gas to acetylene but I’m getting really frustrated! Should I have gone with propane?
Thanks in advance!
Jo
The Healing Jeweler LLC
My shop evolved from a single stage acetylene plumbers torch to an O2/acetylene meco midget torch to a meco midget propane and O2 torch. I also have a Little Torch operating off the samr setup. My current setup is the Meco/Little Torch combo in parallel with a non-regulated 1 lb. propane cyliner and a 5 lpm O2 generator. It all works fine. You should be able to flow solder just fine with what you have. It sounds like the O2 is a bit high in regulated pressure. Over all it sounds like you aren’t getting enough heat to the solder. Also, what kind of soldering pad are you soldering on? Charcoal can make things look a bit dark if you use a lot of flux, but it all works in the end. Do some reading focusing on torch esetup, flux and the soldering pad. Then start over following the advices that you find in the archives. There is a lot on propane and O2 generators in the archives as well as a current topic that is being discussed. You shouldn’t be having the problems that you are describing, especially if you know what to look for from your day job. Good luck…Rob