Sand used as a flux?

[a fellow blacksmith]

i use borax and never had aplroblen with it

[JAFO]

I just joined and noticed this thread. The 'sand' if used should be mud daubers nest, taken whole, crushed and sprinkled onto the pieces to be forged. When the mud or dirt dauber builds its nest, it uses only the purest silica it can find. I have seen this used by a smith in Alabama about two years ago and the weld is still holding.

[Conan_568]

I bought 5 lbs. of anhydras borax on ebay for $10.
It's way better then that 20 mule team stuff.
I keep it in a sealed jar until I'm ready to use it.
Add nothing to it, just use straight borax.
Borax is all I ever use and I never make a bad weld.

[Pault17]

reading through all this is both thought provoking and amazing. REgarding the use of mud-dauber nests, when I was working in the smithy at the state fair, I noticed a coffee can full of the things. when I asked what they were for, they said welding but that nobody had ever tried.

[Mr Smith]

I've seen sand used. It works.

The idea being that small amounts are used as and where needed to stop the sparking.

As for cost - it's lying around all over.

[ThomasPowers]

You may want to read the earlier posts on this subject.

[Mr Smith]

I have. Was there something I missed?

I know a smith, who has spent many years in the trade. His advice on the subject is that sand is a *better* flux, and that I should throw the borax away.

[ThomasPowers]

I thought we had discussed sand in depth and even mentioned dirt daubers---mentioned in one of the FoxFire books I believe...

I demonstrated billet welding to an 82 year old german smith once (Bad Windsheim open air Museum) who thought I had sold my soul to the devil cause I was welding at such low temps. He used sand and I was using borax. he mainly welded low carbon materials that can stand the extra heat and not high carbon knife steels that do not.

I left him the rest of my little sample box of borax so he could track some down...

Plain 20 muleteam borax seems to do fine on my billets though I have a copy of the steel glue receipe for if I get a hankering to weld up high alloy steels.

For real wrought iron I will use clean sand or crushed glass sometimes.

[Mr Smith]

Thomas, from what I had read, the jury was still out. I *assume* I'm reading the same posts you were.

Some people stated that they had seen sand used to no avail, some were stating that it depends on the type of metal used, et cetera.

What I was stating was that I had seen sand used, and it works.

Sand. Plain sand. Not a "mud-daubers'" nest. Not crushed glass. On all types of steel.

That's my contribution. In future, I'll pm you and ask if it's okay to post anything before I do so.

[ThomasPowers]

I'm just not good with accepting blanket statements. The devil is in the details!

Sand on high alloy steel welds with lots of Cr, Ni and 1.5%C? I'm very impressed!

Was this billet welding or just joining two parts?

Though I do freely admit that forge welds of almost anything can be done fluxless under the right conditions...shoot they do them at ambient temperature about a mile over from my office. (Explosive welding facility and yes an explosive weld is more than a mechanical weld it really is solid phase welding.)

No need to ask permission; jump right in if you have new data; please post as many of the details as you can. I'd like to replicate welding stainless steel using only sand!