Still leaking

[briduhunt]

Well I borrowed a soldering iron from a local trader and repaired the holes in my sap pan. I used a flashlight test in the dark and found the smaller holes then I put water in the pan for a water test and had no leaks. This Sunday I did a water test boil so I could see how everything would work out as this is a new rig to me. Well I got the water to a good boil in both pans and then the sap pan began leaking where one of my repairs were. I did test this same area with both a light test and a water test and found no leaks but when I put heat under the pans a leak started. I am not sure what to do, as I brought the pan back in to my basement shop and found the leak area then soldered it again. Did the flashlight test again and the water test and found no more leaks. I am not sure why the pan leaked after the 1st repair and not sure this repair will work under heat. Any ideas on what made this happen and how I can make sure the leak does not happen again under heat. I just started to tap my trees and will want to start to boil sap this weekend. I have only a limited of free time to get this correct prior to actual syrup making needs to start. The leak is nearest to the fire. Any help would be appreciated.

[smitty76]

It is posible that the spot that leaked was not completely sealed. The solder may have melted but the pan was not hot enough for it to stick to the metal completely and is just sitting on the surface, therefore when the pan heated up when you boiled, it expanded the uncomplete solder joint enough for it to leak. All you can do is try it agian.

[Thompson's Tree Farm]

Brian,
If it is still leaking and it is only a tiny bit, you may be able to let the spot "sugar over". We used old english tin pans for years that would leak water when they were clean but as soon as we started to boil sap, they would seal themselves up. When we cleaned then with hot water at the seasons end, the leaks would reappear.

[danno]

Thompson's is right on. For small leaks, the niter from the sap will close them up. When you start boiling sap, it may leak for an half hour or so, but will then close up.

I used to have a small leak in a valve that connected my flue pan to the syrup pan. Would leak for a half hour and stop. I put a pan under the leak just to see how much sap I was losing - amounted to about 2 cups of sap before the hole would fill with niter.

[Haynes Forest Products]

One of the toughest things to do is solder pipe joints if all conditions are against you. And you have a few of thease conditions present. 1 they have been solderd before. 2 your adding solder over solder ROYAL PAIN DUE TO FAIL. 3 having too much solder on a joint.
If you ever tryed to solder a pipe joint with even a hint of water in it your S.O.L. You can gob solder on and you might think its water tight but it fails.WHY because the solder you applied didnt actually get into the joint.
I think what is happening is you have to much solder over the leak and I stress OVER the joint and so what happens is you fill with water and the heat melts the solder BECAUSE the solder is to thick and doesnt get the benefit of the liquid cooling the solder. Try and remove the solder over the leak get to the leak and repair the leak. To much solder will draw the heat in and melt it. I can melt big gobs of solder on a pipe that is full of water but i cant melt the solder in the joint and your leak is being plugged but gobs of solder over the leak not in the leak
Its like welding over a cracked weld wont work grind the weld out and repair the area good to go.

[briduhunt]

I give up. I meet a guy who repairs car radiators and he said he could fix it. I have come to the realization that I am not that handy with sheet metal soldering. I do have gobs of solder on the leaks and so far it is holding except for this leak. It is to big for niter to fix. I will break down and pay someone to fix it properly. Besides if I work on it any more I will have all 10 of my fingers burned instead of the three I have now. I am going to cut my losses. Thanks for all of the input.

[Haynes Forest Products]

Keep us posted we all like to know how they did it. There is nothing worse than a rotten radiator.

[maple flats]

Make very sure the radiator guy is using lead free solder, what they use on radiators is not lead free.

[Big maple]

Yeah, but the lead solder flows so much better

[briduhunt]

What gets me is that these pans and almost every other solderded pan was done with 50/50 l;ead solder along with about 80% or more of our home drinking water lines. If lead was so bad for us then I would think that everyone with a house that had lead soldered pipes would be required to remive them all. Make you think????????
I am soldering my pans with 95/5 solder just for the record but with what little contact the syrup has witrh the lead solder it really will not hurt anyone or has not hurt anyone. Can anyone show me where someone has been sickened by lead in the syrup pans or for that matter lead in the water lines in our house? Just my thoughts.

[KenWP]

One of the reasons the Roman Empire colapsed was because the city was supplied with water useing lead lines and pipes and ducts. But in the water lines of our houses there can't actually be much if any lead contact when you sweat connections on copper tubeing. One of the reasons we have the food rules we do is because countrys like Japan have zero torerance for levels of lead and such on imported foods. They will reject a whole ship load of food if they find any thing they don't like.

[Haynes Forest Products]

I think the lead will effect the brain and cause memory problems.................I think thats what they said I dont know I cant remember.let me get back to you .........what

[danno]

One of the toughest things to do is solder pipe joints if all conditions are against you. And you have a few of thease conditions present. 1 they have been solderd before. 2 your adding solder over solder ROYAL PAIN DUE TO FAIL. 3 having too much solder on a joint.
If you ever tryed to solder a pipe joint with even a hunt of water in it your S.O.L. You can gob solder on and you might think its water tight but it fails.WHY because the solder you applied didnt actually get into the joint.
I think what is happening is you have to much solder over the leak and I stress OVER the joint and so what happens is you fill with water and the heat melts the solder BECAUSE the solder is to thick and doesnt get the benefit of the liquid cooling the solder. Try and remove the solder over the leak get to the leak and repair the leak. To much solder will draw the heat in and melt it. I can melt bi gobs of solder on a pipe that is full of water but i cant melt the solder in the joint and you leak is being plugged but gobs of solder over the leak not in the leak
Its like welding over a cracked weld wont work grind the weld out and repair the area good to go.

Yup, Haynes, you're right. I had a leak that I could just not solder close and just kept pouring the solder on. A buddy of mine came over who knew what he was doing. First thing he did was tourch ALL the old solder off, remove the valve, cleaned well and started the job from scratch. Worked fine and looked alot better than my mess.

[Haynes Forest Products]

Thanks for the feedback I do alot of bathroom remodel an its a hoot to see what others have gone threw to solder copper and I can say I was one of those people. I still have to stop think and just start over. Its like saving bent nails just in case you need one.
I think the next most useless indever is trying to make cement that you mixed up to wet "LOOK GOOD" .......................really so troweling it alot helps............ REALLY Ill try that

[Pat Trevor]

Haynes
I have a 6X10 sodered pan that i purchased last summer and didnt do enough research. It has many leaks. Do you know of anybody that does repairs in wisconsin or around the Green Bay area.

[Haynes Forest Products]

No I dont. I would email Wegner metal works he is on the trader. He lives in green bay. I had a buddy that was a plumber doing my repair he had the patiance and the ability. How bad is it and what have you tried. I can only say that its best if you blow the old off and clean and start over. You will never get a leak that has inbeded crap, niter, scale or soot.

When I was a dental teck the trick to soldering gold or silver and not having it spread out to areas you didnt want the solder to flow to was use a Graphite pencil and draw a line and it wont cross it same with low temp solders dont like carbon and thats inbeded in all the old solder on pans.:mad: by the time you get the area hot enough to burn off the impurities and carbon you have burnt the metal that you want to solder.

[Pat Trevor]

Thanks for taking the time to respond. Wegner doesn't do sodering repairs but does build some nice pans. I was able to find another person in the area that does make repairs nere Green bay. Thanks again