I’m only going to ask one more time since I did post an query a few
weeks ago. What is THE best solder for pewter? I need to use up the
pewter sheets I have and need to solder. NO lead, only food-safe
solders. Any suggestions?
Joy
TIX. Give it a try. Is available from most jewelry suppliers. I find
pewter a bit difficult to solder as the base metal melting point is
not too much above most any of the solders. good luck.
john dach
Joy- Try using tin. There are plenty of lead free tin solders out
there.
Get some pewter scrap and experiment with them.
Have fun and make lots of jewelry
Jo Haemer
timothywgreen.com
Joy,
Ref Pewter solder check out
How to Solder Pewter - Jewelry Discussion - Ganoksin Orchid Jewelry Forum Community for Jewelers and Metalsmiths for some
from Peter Rowe.
Has a general tip if you type the following line
Solder Pewter site:ganoksin.com
It will give you all the posts or articles ever done here on orchid.
Lots of good The site: followed by the website makes
Google a very powerful tool for searching a specific website.
Kay
I have used solder from this company to solder pewter
Ken Gastineau
Gastineau Studio
Stay -brite solder is the best I have found.
Joy
It has been a while, but when I was making pewter vasesI used the
pewter scraps to solder the pieces together. And a low flame, It
melts same rate as paper. Have fun. Jill
For those of you who emailed me off-topic, thank you very much! Now
i have a better idea of what to get, beside the Stay-Brite, and
60/40. Wish me luck - I’m going to have to shift over from an all
silver/gold/copper soldering mentality to soft soldering. There’ll
be a few mishaps and bumps in the road, but metals is a wonderful
journey to continue on. It’s been 16 years since I last soldered
pewter.
Joy
Joy,
I worked with pewter or britania metal quite a bit as an undergrad.
There are several choices for attaching.
Fuse or weld the seam using the pewter itself. Fit your joint as you
wouldfor regular soldering. You will need some liquid flux that is
used for electronics. Make or buy some pewter wire the same gauge as
the metal. Flux the joint and using a small torch tip, melt or
puddle the area, stick feedingthe wire to prevent holes. Afterwards,
you can file, forge and planish theseam until it disappears.
Use a commercial solder called “Stay-Brite”, it can be purchased at
some hardware stores and welding suppliers. This is the best all
around choice. Draw or mill it smaller for more delicate areas. It
comes with it’s own flux “Stay-Clean”.
Bismuth, or Tin based solders are helpful for repairs or really low
temp work.
Let me know if I can answer other questions.
Ruthanne Robertson
Adjunct Associate Professor