Cleaning Copper Fittings?

I've never seen a plumber throw out a fitting because it's too tarnished. We scratch-clean every fitting before sweating, new and old alike.

Not that pre-cleaning a bucket of old fittings is necessarily a bad idea. Maybe a muratic acid solution?

MM

Is there a Plumbing forum that is helpful?

my guess would be no....

I also clean before sweating, the trouble is after fittings get tarnished they seem to resist heat more than when "shiny new"just yesterday I used some of my N.O.S. and had a very hard time getting up to temp. It eventually worked but by the time it was hot enough it had burned out the flux and also overheated the whole fitting. I'll try Muratic but am concerned about fumes from any residual chemical left afterwards. Is there any other ideas?

Interesting. I've never noticed tarnished fitting taking longer to heat. Vintage fittings are heavier. Could that be it?

I'll try Muratic but am concerned about fumes

I would experiment on a few fittings with different ratios of mruiatic acid to water. After the dip be sure to rinse the fittings good with clear water.

You should clean brand new ones before use anyway, even if they look shiny, as they're bound to have various oils and oxides on them. You can get a tool that looks like a screwdriver, but has a stiff wire cleaning brush on the end. You simply insert into the fitting and twist a couple of times. Job done.

For an example, see:

Christian.

Yeah, get one of those cleaning brushes. Cut the handle off the brush and secure the wire part that was attached to the handle into a cordless drill. You can clean the hell out of some fittings this way. FAST and it does a good job. For a quick, easy cleanup, use muriatic acid about 50/50 water and acid. Soak your fittings. They'll look like new. But the acid takes the coating off the fitting, so they will re-tarnish faster if they've been dunked in muriatic acid.

As for older fittings not heating up as fast, first, you might want to use acetylene or mapp gas instead of propane. Second, if you have some real old fittings, the older fittings were cast using thicker material so they will naturally take more time to heat up. Third, if the fitting is dirty (more than tarnish), dirt will also pull heat from the copper.