Bronze material

[Garry Coles]

Hi,
Many years ago I acquired a 4ft X 1in length of bronze !!! propeller shaft from a boatyard. I thought that this would come in handy for the various steam fittings for the many models I have built over the years. However, I have just found out that my very strong magnet has a slight attraction to it, not the full monty like it does with steel. The magnet that I usually use does not attract to it at all. There is no sign of corrosion on the surface at all. Can anyone enlighten me to the content of what might be used in old propeller shafts.
Garry

[uuu]

I have a similar shaft - a little thicker, and it may have been longer! I've used it for all sorts of things - it seems to be decent stuff. It's clearly suitable for bearings, as that's part of it's use in the boat.

Mine's not magnetic - I've just tested it. Correction - a strong magnet does indeed have a slight attraction.

Check a bit for soldering, if that's what you want to do with it - I've had some bronzes (not this one) that just did not take the solder.

Wilf

[brucevoelkerding]

Bronze CDA955 does contain 5% Nickel and 4% Iron. The List on Anchor Bronze's website shows one that not all Bronzes are the same. It really is atrocious to just call something "Bronze".
www.anchorbronze.com/cast-bronze

Note as an Example, the Website uses Cu88 to mean 88% Copper.

[John Baguley]

It could be a type of manganese bronze. A friend worked for Severn Trent Water and he gave me a length of bronze that was an old valve stem he had 'rescued'. He said that was manganese bronze. Haven't tried using it for anything yet but I know a couple of people who have machined cylinders from it.

John

[jo479]

Years ago I made some automatic drain cocks out of magnesium Bronze, when I came to solder the bodies together, the Silver Solder wouldn't look at it, so they went in the scrap bin, quite a while later CUP Alloys attended our club and gave us a talk on Soldering etc, I mentioned to the chap giving us the talk, that I had had no luck trying to solder Magnesium Bronze, he replied add Salt to the Flux, next day I rooted through the scrap pin and found the drain cock bodies, added some salt to the flux and Bingo it worked, so that's your answer if you intend soldering.

[JonL]

Nov 22, 2024 19:05:16 GMT jo479 said:

Years ago I made some automatic drain cocks out of magnesium Bronze, when I came to solder the bodies together, the Silver Solder wouldn't look at it, so they went in the scrap bin, quite a while later CUP Alloys attended our club and gave us a talk on Soldering etc, I mentioned to the chap giving us the talk, that I had had no luck trying to solder Magnesium Bronze, he replied add Salt to the Flux, next day I rooted through the scrap pin and found the drain cock bodies, added some salt to the flux and Bingo it worked, so that's your answer if you intend soldering.

Interesting little hint! Thank you