[badolebroad]

I recently went into the crawl space under the house. I was horrified to find that the plumber never cleaned off the joints after soldering them. Two tell tale clues: green stuff on all of the joints AND solidifed solder drips under the joints. I know that this flux can corrode the copper. So far, no evidence of pin-hole leaks. I have been advised to use a wire brush to clean off the joints. My question(S):

Do I need to use some type of cleaner after using the wire brush?

Is it too late? (This house was built in the summer of 2001).

Thank you

[speedball1]

Simply wire brush the old flux off and squirt a little oil around the joiint to neutralize the acid. Good luck, Tom

[M Ray Graham]

Flux would melt off the solder joints when soldered leave it alone should not be a problum

[ballengerb1]

Why " I was horrified " about this? Do you solder much yourself, its no big deal, you are fine.

[KISS]

I agree with the original poster. Flux in the crawl space invites corrosion. Problem is, the flus becomes very difficult to remove.

You could use a commercial spray such as these: flux remover

Or Hot water and baking soda. As warm as you can get it and handle with gloves.

A wire brush does nothing with flux. It will remove the existing corrosion, but it just spreads the flux.

So, two options:
1) commercial spray flux remover
2) Baking soda and hot water mixture

[Milo Dolezal]

As suggested, use Wire Brush, Steel Wool, Sand Cloth, Mesh Cloth or sandpaper to remove corrosion caused by the left-over flux. The flux itself will go away easily when heated up a bit. Even scrub pad used for pots and pans dipped in hot water may do the trick

Shock I would be not. It does happen. We see it all over... especially with the "discount plumbers". You save few bucks but...