The effort to reduce lead in the water supply by the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act has resulted in the search for brasses without lead for use in plumbing components. “Lead Free” C693 silicon brass is an alternative to the C360 leaded brass that had been the standard for plumbing components for many years. A failure analysis of a plumbing component fabricated from the “Lead Free” brass C693 silicon brass revealed the failure mechanism to be stress corrosion cracking (SCC). Contributing factors included microstructural variation, banding, and high residual stresses in the raw material hex bar.