On 13 Jan 2005 17:01:21 GMT, (Andrew
Gabriel) wrote:

In article ,
Mike Armstrong writes:

snip
I am wondering whether it would be easier to apply heat to the
reducing connector to 'un-make' the joint. The question is how hard
is it to clean up the 'un-made' end in preparation for the new 22mm
straight-through connector?

Redoing a joint like this which was done OK originally is not difficult.
You don't have to clean the pipe end up, just make sure the pipe end is
tinned all the way round (i.e. that it was a good joint originally).
You might not be able to push the coupler over the solder. In this case,
you will have to heat the pipe end in order to push the cleaned/fluxed
coupler on, and then heat the joint as normal until solder flows and add
a little more to make up for that lost in the reducer.

Redoing a joint when the original was not OK is harder, and would require
the pipe end to be cleaned up (and a new fitting as it's generally not
worth cleaning up an old one which failed to solder correctly in the
first place).


The joint is OK. I did a pressure drop test when fitting our gas fire
last week.

So the procedure would be :-

1. Heat existing reducer and remove (with tongs!)
2. Cleaing and flux the new 22m pipe end
3. Clean and flux _both_ ends of inside of new 22mm connector
4. Mate new pipe and new connector ready to heat.
5. Heat old pipe end to soften existing solder
6. While still hot, lower new assembly onto pipe and continue to heat
until joint is made, adding extra solder if necessary.

Clearly, I will be carrying out another soundness test on completion.


Once cleaned up would another soldered joint be necessary?
Compression would be easier!

Not allowed for gas in an inaccessible or confined space.
Are you sure you are competent to do the gas side?
Don't forget to do a soundness test before and after (so you know if
you've introduced a leak, and/or if there was originally a leak which
you need to go and find).