Harvey and Brian - I have a 1948 Schwinn Town and Country tandem frame that appears to be fillet brazed and it without a doubt is leaded at the head joint. I say without a doubt at least to my satisfaction since I have been involved with the electronics industry for over 30 years as a technician and then electrical engineer. I will do a bit more checking, especially with my soldering iron which has a variable heat range and digital display up to 900 degrees F. It should be fairly easy to determine the melting point. Regards, John Wilson Greensburg, PA USA
Harvey wrote:
>Brian - I don't think that you're right on this one, but I might be
>confused. My memory is that I used a fair amount of heat to burn the
>paint before the metal started dripping out, that the color was the
>grey-silver of lead, and I might convince myself that I remember it
>being heavy. But, that was over 30 years ago. It's also possible that
>Schwinn changed what they used over time.
>The old-fashioned plumber's solder with the nice low melting point was
>pretty cheap. I still have a couple of rolls of it, and the Oatey is
>marked 40 tin/60 lead. Any alloy like this should have a lower melting
>point than either of the constituents by itself. If I recall correctly,
>the min. melting point alloy is the "Eutectic" mix; hence the name of
>the brazing/welding supply outfit.
>On the other hand, I don't have any more of those tandem frames, and it
>might have been one of those trick alloys, like the stuff they used for
>teaspoons that melted when you stirred the tea. Yuck. My memory, but
>you would know it much better than I, is that some of these had such low
>melting points that they were used to fill stays and such before bending
>them, to keep the round cross section. Easy to melt and pour in, easy to
>melt out.
>regards, and thanks for the note.
harvey sachs
McLean VA
brianbaylis@juno.com wrote:
>> Harvey,
>> I've seen some Schwinns like you mentioned. The filler is probably not
>> lead, but a low temp. solder of some sort. The one I worked on the
>> material acted more like aluminium than lead. Probably some sort of
>> soft solder.
> > Brian Baylis
> >La Mesa, CA