Soldering Technique...

hanson · 2005-09-07T11:51:15+00:00

I had to solder some copper water supply pipes recently. Fortunately,none of the connections leaked. I am using a standard butane (blue)torch.With most joints, when I touched the solder to the heated metal, thesolder was drawn into the joint just as it should be. But on a coupleof joints, the melted solder seemed to ball up on the surface of thepipe (though these connection still did not leak).Why would this happen? -Did I not clean the surface properly? -Did I not apply enough flux? -Did I overheat the joint before applying the solder?Thanks for your help.