I’m struggling a little, can you help?

[Richard187]

Hey all! Have found this forum super helpful so thanks for the advice!

I’m several months into welding with my Clarke 120 inverter multi welder

I’m using a 10% CO₂ / 90% Argon mix

I’m butt welding car body panels mainly, I’ll post some pictures below, but I’ll first describe my issue:

1. Inconsistent arc, some sizzles, pops, silence. All over the place, feels inconsistent and a struggle
2. Really easy to blow through
3. Spatter
4. Terribly hard to adjust, just a single dial on the machine. 1mm one way seems too low, 1 mm the other seems too high
5. Inconsistent penetration
6. I don’t know if I’m the problem or my welder is - after-all and good works-man always blames his…

I did some googling and found the following but not sure how true it is:
1. My gas mix ratio might not be ideal
2. The 120 welders low end voltage might not be ideal for a stable arc, a 150 might be better for example
3. The single dial control could mean that it’s mapping of voltage to speed isn’t set best for thin steel
4. The motor may be providing an inconsistent wire speed

What have I done so far:
1. Made sure my gas flow is around 13 with a flow meter (reading on this was very different my swp regulator)
2. Done a tonne of practice welds and found the sweet spot on the dial
3. Made sure the ground is good - always ground back to fresh shiny steel
4. Made sure the tip and shroud are good
5. I’m using 0.6 wire

Would love to hear your thoughts! I mean it’s getting the job done, but when I learnt I learnt on a mightmig and it seemed way easier to get a nice flat weld on thing steel.

Cheers all

 

[Richard187]

Here’s a few others photos for reference

Maybe I just need more practice and patience

 

[Misterg]

Hello and welcome

First question: Which sockets on the front of the welder are the torch & earth clamp plugged into?

 

[Erie Fred]

Are you holding the wire tip a consistent distance from the work ?

 

[jo1010]

I'd suggest practising on the bench with cleaned and shiny scrap same thickness as your car body ....get to know what works and what doesn't - can you get decent flat welds that way? If you can't get the welds you want on the bench don't go near the car - you'll get frustrated....
It's a 20amp machine so should be ideal for thin stuff ( I used Clarke mig pro 90 for years and it was ok). Older Clarke's have separate volts and wire speed controls - your modern version isn't like that - and your AI results give indirect hints about that....
Your welds look cold - like they could do with more volts, but you say your already blowing through.....so back to basics....
1. Using a 10/20 litre gas cylinder?
2. Wire drive roller tension correct?
3. Can you see weld puddle clearly?
4. Practice seam welds on clean 1.0 steel on the bench, then if that looks good to you try some butt welds. Show the results here.

 

[8ob]

As above, play around on the bench with some thin sheet. No need to set up practice pieces, just run a thin disc up some oddsnsodds and play with the settings. The start on gapped thin sheet is the hardest part, you need to stop/start for a second just to get going.

Below was not prepped, could probably get away with a tad less wire and drop a few amps.

 

[Richard187]

Morning all thanks a lot for the help!

Really appreciate the swift responses.

Just to answer a few questions from above:

1. I’ve checked and double checked that the torch and earth clamped are plugged in the right way, but good shout thank you!

2. I think distance and angle of torch tip definitely come into it and I’m working on being consistent

3. I’m using a 20 litre 10% weld mix cylinder

4. Wire roller I’ve setup correctly to the best of my knowledge, followed the Clarke instructions and also double checked with a few sources online that tension is enough but not too tight

5. Agree that the welds above look cold, but it seemed like going any higher blew through. I’ve read that the single dial machines can be quite sensitive so maybe I need to trial finer adjustments

6. Regarding seeing weld puddle clearly, sometimes it’s normal, visible puddle, good-ish weld, other times I end up with a molten blob that burns up to the wire tip. Which I think hints at ‘stick out’ distance too short or wire feed issues would you say?

7. I did a load of practicing on clean steel on the bench and was able to get flatter consistent welds, but there was only minor practice with a small gap to simulate butt welding

I’ll do some more practicing this weekend and report back.

Thanks again for your help guys!
Appreciate it

 

[Misterg]

I’ve checked and double checked that the torch and earth clamped are plugged in the right way

Which is... ?

 

[tom2207]

looks like a bit less wire would do you good, so turn the wire thickness setting up one size , try that .
if you dont like it , try the other settings and see , check the wire tension feed is right and the drag setting on the wire drum is ok too.
I really dont like machines without control it can make situations like this tricky to get sorted.

 

[Smallfry]

As already said, weld looks too cold. I am no professional, but if its burning back, it needs a touch more wire speed, but as this is not possible, try keeping the torch lead as straight as possible. Is your wire at all rusty ? That will not help.

When doing thin stuff like this, I spend a lot of time trying to get the fit up as good as possible with no gaps as its less likely to blow through. When you are trying to fill a gap it introduces more heat.

 

[chrismac]

Morning all thanks a lot for the help!

Really appreciate the swift responses.

Just to answer a few questions from above:


2. I think distance and angle of torch tip definitely come into it and I’m working on being consistent

The closer the tip the hotter the weld, pull back and the weld is cooler, good to know this for some things, like getting a hotter tack at times,

Your going about it the right way, good luck.

 

[Richard187]

Cheers all!

Which is... ?

Earth going to the negative, torch bridged to positive

As already said, weld looks too cold. I am no professional, but if its burning back, it needs a touch more wire speed, but as this is not possible, try keeping the torch lead as straight as possible. Is your wire at all rusty ? That will not help.

When doing thin stuff like this, I spend a lot of time trying to get the fit up as good as possible with no gaps as its less likely to blow through. When you are trying to fill a gap it introduces more heat.

Wire is almost brand new, still nice and shiny. Good shout on the fit of the panel, I'll definitely admit that there has been few larger gaps than necessary which hasn't helped with blow through. I've been using a brass backing plate behind where possible. Cheers!

looks like a bit less wire would do you good, so turn the wire thickness setting up one size , try that .
if you dont like it , try the other settings and see , check the wire tension feed is right and the drag setting on the wire drum is ok too.
I really dont like machines without control it can make situations like this tricky to get sorted.

Thanks! Interesting idea on the wire thickness, will give that a go to see what happens. I agree regarding lack of control on the machine, I did an evening welding course years ago and learnt on a machine that had separate dials and it was way easier to tune.


Thanks!

 

[Erie Fred]

The closer the tip the hotter the weld, pull back and the weld is cooler, good to know this for some things, like getting a hotter tack at times,

Your going about it the right way, good luck.

Very much so, much more than when stick welding.

As the OP is spot welding, I would suggest getting a shield for that with the wings.
Press it tightly to the steel, get consistent results.

 

[Misterg]

Earth going to the negative, torch bridged to positive

(Just checking! )

 

[jo1010]

... decreasing wire speed will decrease voltage on these - and the fact you have burn back suggests volts are too high, so that might be better......BUT....
The welds do *look* cold, suggesting volts are actually too low....ha
The practice pieces will show what you can do as work arounds, and how much wire selection can affect the weld. Let's see...

 

[Richard187]

... decreasing wire speed will decrease voltage on these - and the fact you have burn back suggests volts are too high, so that might be better......BUT....
The welds do *look* cold, suggesting volts are actually too low....ha
The practice pieces will show what you can do as work arounds, and how much wire selection can affect the weld. Let's see...

Yeah it’s a bit of a catch 22 I’ve come to realise should have just spent a bit more for a bit more control.

Will do some practice and report back! Cheers

 

[Pete.]

When you use up your bottle you might want to switch to 5% mix like argoshield light. Less co2 means less penetration. It should help with your burn-through since you're doing thin panels.

 

[wyn]

I remember when i had a clarke 151 mig The wire grooves on the drive roller were on the opposite side to the lettering.

When i could see the 0.6 lettering facing me on the roller it was actually the 0.8 groove that the wire was running in.

 

[Richard187]

When you use up your bottle you might want to switch to 5% mix like argoshield light. Less co2 means less penetration. It should help with your burn-through since you're doing thin panels.

Ah yes I did read this (after ordering the gas I have of course haha). Thanks though, will move to 5% next!

I remember when i had a clarke 151 mig The wire grooves on the drive roller were on the opposite side to the lettering.

When i could see the 0.6 lettering facing me on the roller it was actually the 0.8 groove that the wire was running in.

Interesting! I’ll double check this one tomorrow!

 

[eddie49]

With an inverter MIG welder you should be able to run slightly longer tacks, rather than just spots, before the accumulated heat starts to risk burn-through. Maybe not as long as the very impressive run by 8ob in Post #6, but at least 5 or 10 mm long. However, that relies on the pre-programmed synergic mapping - i.e. the voltage-to-wirespeed ratio - being correct, and unfortunately that is sometimes not the case in these low-end machines. Some of them offer a manual voltage "trim" dial, of +/- one or two volts or 5% - even the £105 Dirty Pro 140A has this. Alternatively, a more traditional 2-dial machine, with separate controls for voltage and wirespeed, avoids this risk, whilst still having the fully-variable advantage of an inverter.
I would echo the comments about changing to 5% gas mix, and experimenting with fooling the synergic settings into a different mode by switching to the "wrong" wire diameter.