Help with flange?

[Dnderhead]

it can take some time to do so

[PolishedPA]

The yeast did finally 'wake' up. It took right around 16 hours of the vessel being at 80 degrees f. Does anybody have any ideas to secure my pot lid other than with clips? I'm open for any extravagant ideas you may have. Thanks

[mash rookie]

Ozone is holding back on you. You could weld the copper flange to stainless with a tig if you want using silicon bronze rod. (he could)

If you are going silver solder a joint that has to take the weight of your column make the contact area as large as possible. Soft solder is not as strong.

Tin both surfaces first with silver solder and flux designed for stainless steel being careful where you apply the thin flux. It is watery. I like to apply two coats with a small artist paint brush. Be careful not to over heat.

Then, to connect them use a water base soldering flux and indirect heat until they settle together.

(What Ozone said) Set the lid on 3-4 bricks standing on end. Set another brick for weight on top of the flange. Apply the heat gently from above and below until solder flows.

MR

[PolishedPA]

Ok, id like to do that. I was worried about the weight being an issue. Id have to take it somewhere and have it tig welded. Does anyone make wire for a mig with argon? Or rods i could buy that are safe ? The last time i welded SS, it didnt come in contact with anything i had to worry about. I have a mig and a stick welder but no tig set up. Where would i get flux for SS? Can it be brazed?

[Dnderhead]

Iv MiG copper to stainless with stainless,,but you mite want to practice first.
it can be brazed but careful not to burn the stainless .

[myles]

I have soldered copper to stainless a few times with varying degrees of success, but I don't like to do it as it is really easy to get it wrong. Has anyone mentioned your stainless lid yet? Is it rigid enough to take the weight of whatever you are attaching to it.

As you are already attaching your flange to a sheet of copper, why not make that sheet of copper the size of your lid? If your lid is reasonably strong you can line it with thin copper sheet. Just rivet the copper sheet onto the stainless lid and solder over the rivet heads on the copper side. You can then solder the flange to the copper lining and have avoided any need to solder copper to stainless. A few rivets right through the flange and the stainless will give a bit more security and structural strength.

The soldered copper to copper is your vapour tight joint, combined with the rigidity provided by riveting the copper to the stainless.

[PolishedPA]

I like the sounds of that. My lid does seem to be pretty rigid. Ive been calling around, and it seems to be a little problem getting a sheet of copper that big. I checked lowes and they have sheets, but i think they were only 10"x10" Even if i cant get a copper sheet the size of my lid, i can get the biggest one i can find and rivet it to the lid. What do you think i should put between the 2 for a gasket/seal?

[PolishedPA]

Before I tried the rivet thing on my 18 gal boiler, i wanted to see if i could do make it work first. I used a 5 gal SS stock pot that my fiance had laying around, and hopefully doesnt ever need. I tried for a few hours to get the rivets to work and i couldnt get it. It seemed like my 'gasket' was too thick and it kept pulling through the copper plate. So after all of those failed attempts, i just decided to used 4 SS bolts with the flanged end soldered to one plate, bolted through the lid with another copper plate on top. So the lid is sandwiched in between. I think thats the route ill take with my larger boiler too. Heres some pics, and a pic of the final set up with the 5 gal pot going to a 3/8 worm. My 18 gal boiler will go into a 3/4 worm, but everything else will be the same. Anyone see any problems or issues with it?

[Prairiepiss]

Stainless bolts good.

What are you using for a gasket?

[PolishedPA]

Its just a piece of cardboard covered in teflon. Is that something thats going to last or am i going to have to replace it often? I realy didnt want to use any teflon or that compression fitting going to the worm, but sometimes ya do what ya gotta do i guess.

[mash rookie]

Ok, id like to do that. I was worried about the weight being an issue. Id have to take it somewhere and have it tig welded. Does anyone make wire for a mig with argon? Or rods i could buy that are safe ? The last time i welded SS, it didnt come in contact with anything i had to worry about. I have a mig and a stick welder but no tig set up. Where would i get flux for SS? Can it be brazed?

No. You can not MIG stainless to copper. I have even tried copper to copper with Copper De Ox wire and Helium gas. Doesn’t work. I MIG stainless to stainless often. Stainless can be TIG'd but not brazed. My experience is that the heat necessary to hard silver solder or "braze" will burn off silver solder flux. If they make a flux that works at the higher temps, I have not found it.

Soft silver solder or TIG is my only advice. Good luck.
MR

[myles]

I have brazed copper to stainles steel with a 56% silver solder and borax based flux. Trouble is the working temperature of the flux and solder is 620 - 655 degC. Getting this with MAP gas is no problem however, expecially on thin stainless, it is easy for the stainless to get TOO hot. Hit 800 degC and the stainless is seriously damaged - weld decay. As stainless does not transmit heat well it is surprising how fast a thin walled stock pot will flash past glowing red to incandescent in a localised spot.

There is a good soft solder with a liquid flux for joining stinless to stainless, but the flux is so agressive that it seriously damage copper if you try to solder copper to stainless with it.

You can get away with soldering heavy brass fittings into stainless if you ONLY heat the brass.



You will never get the fitting out again though. I soldered this 2" coupling into a stock pot for practice. I still don't have a use for it.

[PolishedPA]

I made a gasket to go between the boiler and the lid. I used the method that was on here in an earlier thread with the cardboard wrapped in teflon, PTFE. I think it wil seal up just fine but back to my earlier question. Does anybody have a better way to secure the lid other than the black clips, bricks, or god-forbid, ratchet straps. I refuse to use the black clips unless i absolutely have to. I have considered ways like 1" C channel over the top with a swing on one side and a spring on the other to hold it down. Also some sort of way with the C channel with tabs, allthread, and wing nuts but i just wanted to see if anybody else had any ideas before i started. Thanks.

[Dnderhead]

Ive brazed stainless and copper with regular brazing rod,I've silver brazed stainless and copper,I've mig stainless,I've mig stainless to copper.and I've tig copper and stainless .though with any thin stainless its easy to burn.but it can be done..you cant use soldering flux for brazing.good old borax will do.usually when doing copper with a mig, phosphorus bronze is used this helps remove oxygen.if miging stainless to copper with stainless.you weld on the stainless working it onto the copper.this melts the copper and fuses both together.
I dont know if you call this "welding" as its more of "fusing" .its done all the time in "oxygen free furnaces"
that is how things like blichmann wort cooler are made. the parts are cleaned,stacked with copper between, then heated in oxygen free furnace.when soldering or brazing ,if the stainless or copper is red hot then you have overheated.I've see many on this site that has done this,,its because they dont have "enough" heat for large pipe so they heat the pipe hotter in one spot,this only oxidizes the pipe.to solder small pipe or large pipe its "more" heat that is needed.if you are cooking a whole pig instead of a pork chop, you dont use a jet burner.you use a bigger grill.

[just-a-sip]

but back to my earlier question. Does anybody have a better way to secure the lid other than the black clips, bricks, or god-forbid, ratchet straps. I refuse to use the black clips unless i absolutely have to. I have considered ways like 1" C channel over the top with a swing on one side and a spring on the other to hold it down. Also some sort of way with the C channel with tabs, allthread, and wing nuts but i just wanted to see if anybody else had any ideas before i started. Thanks.

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? ... CH8Q8gIwAA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

on my first rig i welded 4 of these on my lid and boiler (well notthese but simmiler) they worked great in pulling the lid tight on my seal and they were dishwasher safe, as my boiler was only 25L and fit in there just fine for cleaning.

[PolishedPA]

but back to my earlier question. Does anybody have a better way to secure the lid other than the black clips, bricks, or god-forbid, ratchet straps. I refuse to use the black clips unless i absolutely have to. I have considered ways like 1" C channel over the top with a swing on one side and a spring on the other to hold it down. Also some sort of way with the C channel with tabs, allthread, and wing nuts but i just wanted to see if anybody else had any ideas before i started. Thanks.

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? ... CH8Q8gIwAA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

on my first rig i welded 4 of these on my lid and boiler (well notthese but simmiler) they worked great in pulling the lid tight on my seal and they were dishwasher safe, as my boiler was only 25L and fit in there just fine for cleaning.

Damnit, i wish i would've thought of those. I ended up making 4 bracket/clamp thingamabobs to hold it down. They work and i like tinkering with shit like that. I am in the process of making a 4 gal boiler for spirit runs and I will most definitely be using those. In my job, i actually open and close them about 20-30 times a day and i never thought about using them. After i read your post, i want to steal everyone that i see. Thanks!

[just-a-sip]

no problem man that's what this place is for... that was just one of my good ideas. I only hope someone else reads this thread who has the same problem... i got so much help from this place that i love passing anything i know on