Lessons involving heat
This bank holiday weekend I was working on the gates for the drive. Not surprisingly the pre-drilled holes in the gate posts for the mountings were in the wrong places so I had to re-drill them all and fill the spare ones. As quick tip on filling the holes is to countersink the holes to give more surface area for the filler to stick to. I also brazed the replacement latch pin back onto the gate. There was also time for a BBQ but I ended up turning that into a mini metal work project by adding some re-enforcing struts to stop it wobbling so much.
Lesson 1: If you want to braze a small pin onto a steel gate then you are going to need a powerful heat source as all the heat is absorbed into the frame of the gate.
Lesson 2: If your workshop is approx 30°C then the chemical metal you are using to fill the spare holes in the gate posts will set a lot faster than the quoted 10 minutes.
Metal sculpture in brass, mounted on an 1800s French Coin
[…] flux, I started to heat it with my medium sized torch as it was a lot smaller than the gate (See lessons in heat). My torch is just a little regulator that fits onto the top of a small gas canister which also […]