metalwork

Parquetry Shooting Plane, Part 3

Once I had the beveled bronze cheek fitted and cut for the side opening it was time to silver solder the two major pieces together.  Silver soldering pieces together at an angle can be tricky because if you get it wrong the pieces just stay together in the wrong conformation and you have to torch them REALLY hot to get them apart (usually warping at least one of the two pieces) or saw them apart.

I clamped the pieces together in place at the narrow dimension of the bevel but needed to shim the widest point to get the angle correct.  After prepping the surface and slathering on the paste flux I lit ‘er up with the MAPP torch.  It took a couple minutes to get the entire mass up to temperature but then the solder flowed like water into the crevices where it was supposed to go.  I introduced the solder along the inside corner of the joint and let it heat-wick to the outside, the liquid solder being drawn to the torch.  There was surprisingly little excess solder to be cleaned off afterwards.

I let the mass cool down slowly in the ambient temperatures and returned a hour later to a hard assemblage in the exact correct configuration.

That’s a day worth celebrating.