Gentlemen:

I am building furniture with 1 X 1 & 1X 2 steel tubing (16 ga.). To enhance the look I would like to TIG braze 16 ga. brass or even copper to the ends of the tubing. I have tried 1/16 silicon bronze and 1/16 aluminum bronze as fillers with very sporadic results. Much popping and creating a white powdery substance. I have also ruined a Furic #10 cup with brass imbedding itself in the screen. I've tried using 40-60 amps and various pulse settings with not much success.

Any tips would be most appreciated. Dan @ American Welding Design.

There are 2 types of silicon bronze. One is for oxy fuel torches, and one is for TIG. If you have the wrong stuff it makes a mess.

I bought 16 ga. brass coupons and the alu/bronze and the er/cu filler rods from Weld Metals Online and still have had only limited success. Thanks for responding. dk

I had a similar experience trying to fabricobble some brass fittings with TIG. Brass contains zinc and lead which both react poorly to intense heat. The zinc will create a white coating on everything around it and the lead will pop if exposed to the arc. Brass and copper both do well with solder. Never soldered to steel but a lower temp process may work out better.
Hope this helps.

You may be getting it too hot. You only need to heat the parent metal to take the braze filler. When it wets nicely its done. If you are having issues staying low enough not to melt parent metal and then too low that nothing melts, then try preheating the part a little. It usually isnt needed but can help with dissimilar metals with different melt points. Pre heat and then concentrate the arc on the filler favoring the metal with a higher melting point slightly more. ( if they are both similar melt point then favor the one with higher heat conductivity a little instead)
Ive found about 57 amps dc give or take, and a gas lens is pretty good for silicon bronze, you may need to adjust for dissimilar metal joints. It really is just practise and experimenting.

Thanks for your responses. Weld and learn, one day at a time. If I can make it work, I will let you know. [email protected] Welding Design.

Hey, I have had a similar experience when it comes to actually working on brass, in my case I was just fooling around with CGA regulator fittings. It might go a lot better if you can use AC, just because of the brass. I'd use about 30Amps DC, maybe 40-60 AC if its 1/16 and you might find that stepping down to .045 wire could be helpful if you have trouble melting w/o getting that awful popping sound. I know exactly what you're talking about though, it scared the hell out of me lol

BTW, ERCu is deoxidized copper, so it might not work too well for brazing or brass. I havent used that but if it isn't ERCuSi-A, then I'd use the ERCuAl-A2 (Aluminum Bronze for joining) instead. ERCuAl-A1 is similar, but it's for overlay/buildup. It doesn't have the iron content that A2 has.

Thank you again for your responses, very helpful. I just saw a post on Instagram by Birdman the Welder fabricating a large brass hood for a stove. Beautiful results! Trying to get him to share his technique. Dan @ American Welding Design