Soldering using the base metal as the filler

Hi folks. Longtime lurker, first time poster. I’m not a jeweler, but
I play around at various forms of metal working and I have a question
that jewlers might be able to answer.

Someone told me that it was an old jewler’s trick to solder coin
silver using coin silver filings and flux – that is, using the same
material for both the filler and the pieces being joined. Apparently
the filings melt just before the larger pieces. Is anyone here
familiar with this technique?

Can someone direct me to a written discussion of it in a book (or
books)? Does it work with materials other than silver? And can
anyone explain why the filings would melt before the pieces being
joined? Is it just a question of arriving at the melting temperature
a few seconds sooner?

Thanks very much.
Matt

yes your right smaller heats up faster… its obvious,and yes it
will work…

cheers

Matt- If you are using the same metal instead of solder it’s called
fusing.

If you use solder it’s soldering.

I’ve successfully fused platinum and 18kt gold. I do this so that I
can size a ring without a solder seam. I’ve tried fusing silver but
it didn’t work out for me.

Instead of fillings, I take a part of the original metal and roll it
out super thin. As in I close the rollers all the way down on my
rolling mill and then run it through. I then use that piece to
weld/fuse with. To get the metal to fuse without melting the whole
shank can be a tricky operation. Kinda like walking on a high wire
with out a net.

Jo Haemer
www.timothywgreen.com