Instead of "shoe shining" away with the emery paper use it held against a small piece of wood like an ice cream pop stick first to level the high spots then change to shoe shining to polish. Shoe shining on its own tends to make the lows lower as well as the highs. Not sure if any of you guys work with copper and brass for a living but here's my thoughts on the repair job. Yes it's not pretty but maybe take the following into account and cut the guy some slack The original Faema brazing example is pretty but the fillet on the outside is not what counts, its the capillary flow all the way through the joint that is important. On the fitting that cracked, it looks like they didn't get the braze material all the way through the joint, as it shouldn't have failed like it did if they had. The cross threaded fitting probably didn't help things either...... Rebrazing 60 year old copper and brass that is contaminated with who knows what is not always that easy either. Sometimes new brazing rod and flux doesn't get along with what was there originally and getting the braze material to wet out and flow and go where you want it to go is a downright "b!@tch" The colour of the braze suggests that it was a lower silver content than the original, again that doesn't flow as well either, actually the colour looks more like the joint mentioned where the tee was fitted. If he didn't use flux then it doesn't work so well on copper to brass joints. As it does on the copper - copper joint where the Tee is installed that's simple in comparison as silver phosphorous copper brazing rod is self fluxing so if the copper is clean its just a case of heat it evenly and flow the joint. But ultimately I reckon its a 60 year old machine and it's entitled to a few battle scars 🙂
