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[horsecow]

Anyone on here know anything or have any experience of welding lead? I know it can be done as I've seen the finished product many times for roofs etc. I was wondering what gasses are used and would it be very hard to do?? I've never done any welding in my life at all although I've used burning gear quite a bit in demolition works etc so I presume the gas set-up is similar?

[Andy B]

Is 'welding' lead not soldering 

I can't say that I've ever seen the end result, but I'd guess that the melting point of lead is too low to be using any sort of flame without ending up with a pool of molten lead  Solder is was more or less just lead.

[RobG]

http://www.wikihow.com/Weld-Lead

[Varche]

Only ever worked with lead once. 1982. Ripped all the lead pipe out of our house and "did" a wiped lead joint. Lead to copper. Huge success. !!

When we were children we made our own fishing lead weights out of church roof lead. Our next door neighbour got some splatter stuck to his eye lid!!!

[RobG]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=7DbamTXhA7c

[horsecow]

Ah- ha. Cheers Rob, I knew there was def a flame involved but was also thinking that lead would have a very low melting point. I wonder what type of gas would be best to use for this? Someone told me that oxy-acetylene is used but I think this might be very hot?

[RobG]

Ah- ha. Cheers Rob, I knew there was def a flame involved but was also thinking that lead would have a very low melting point. I wonder what type of gas would be best to use for this? Someone told me that oxy-acetylene is used but I think this might be very hot?

Set the gas pressures on both regulators to 0.14-0.2 bar

[horsecow]

That youtube clip makes it look quite easy and I'm really interested in trying this. There is good money to be made in making lead trays aprons etc because there are very few people doing it where I am so might have to give it a go. Thanks guys

[mantahatch]

My Brother is a plumber, has been all his life. He does lead welding including all the roof stuff on valleys and chimneys etc. He uses a porta pak oxy acetylene, is small but still quite a handful to get up on the scaffolding.

[Marks DTM Calib]

I tried it once and it was not to difficult to do.

It is frustrating though as its quite a slow process (unless you want to blow holes in the work piece).

Reality is that most joints can be soldered which is much faster and can be just as strong

[martin42]

i used to do a lot of lead welding,long time ago,need a small gas torch,with no1 or no2 sized nozzels,its may look easy to do,but there is an art to it tho,need any help drop me a pm 
soldering is totally different to lead welding and also wiping a joint,worked with lead for a long time on roofs and plumbing,still got all my lead tools in garage and welding equipment except the gas bottles

[horsecow]

Cheers lads, I gathered there would be a certain knack to it but I'd like to give it a try so might look into getting the gear together for it. I imagine I could pick it up fairly handy as I'm good with my hands and it'd be another string to my bow

[martin42]

lol,gas bottles wont be cheap,vertical welding lead now thats another story,you should be able to buy a book on lead burning,and have a good read up on it,what lead are you thinking of welding, code3,4,5 or 6? 3 is thinnest and 6 is thickest,maybe try so lead bashing aswell,thats even harder to do

[horsecow]

Its mostly code 4 I've used although have also used 5 and 6 as well. By lead bashing to you mean beating into shapes as I'm pretty handy at that already.

[martin42]

yep lead dressing,shaping lead for flashings and lead roofs etc