In article . com, " wrote:
I'm using Oatey silver lead-free solder and Oatey H-20 water soluble
flux.

That's most of your problem. Forget the silver solder. That stuff is a
pain in the butt; the melting temperature is much too high, especially for
someone who's never done this before. Forget the water-soluble flux, too.

Get some regular lead-free solder, not the silver stuff. Then look for Oatey
No. 95 Lead Free Tinning Flux, or Harvey's Soldering Paste.

Clean the pipe and the fittings with emory cloth or sandpaper. Make sure the
pipe is clean a half-inch beyond the fitting. Flux both the inside of the
fitting and the outside of the pipe.

Light up your torch, and heat the fitting ONLY. DO NOT heat the pipe. There's
enough contact between the two that the pipe will get hot enough anyway. What
you want to avoid is heating the pipe up enough that it expands into the
fitting and prevents solder from wicking into the joint. Instead, you want to
expand the fitting away from the pipe a bit, to make it easier for the solder
to get in there. Again, DON'T HEAT THE PIPE. Just the fitting. After about
twenty seconds, touch the solder to the seam between pipe and fitting, on the
side away from the torch. If the solder doesn't melt into the seam
immediately, withdraw it and continue heating. Try again another five or ten
seconds later; repeat as needed until the solder flows readily into the joint.


Just a simple propane torch.

That'll work for 1" pipe -- it just takes longer. MAPP works better.

By the way, the "4 to 5 seconds" you said you saw on some web site is surely
for a MAPP torch on 1/2" pipe. No way in the world are you going to get a 1"
pipe hot enough to solder in four seconds even with MAPP, let alone propane.

I definitely need the practice. Unfortunately, at this rate I'm pretty
sure I'm not saving any money by doing it myself. I should have just
paid for a real plumber to do this from the beginning. But now I've
spent nearly $80 in supplies. I might as well try to finish the job.

You're well off to heed dpb's advice to get some 1/2 pipe and fittings, and
practice. You're looking at maybe another ten bucks in materials. Follow the
procedure I described above, and you'll have the hang of it in half an hour.
And then you'll have acquired a new skill. It's really not as hard as some
folks would have you believe. I think your biggest problem here is using the
wrong materials.

If I did it wrong and I have an unfinished solder joint, can I pick up
again to finish it, or do you think I'll just need to cut away that
section and start over with a new coupling?

You should be able to continue with that joint, if you clean it thoroughly
first.

--
Regards,
Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

It's time to throw all their damned tea in the harbor again.