AC/DC aluminum settings.

[ducati2242]

I am having difficulty trying to set up my tig for aluminum . Just to many knobs. Having been an amateur welder for more years than I want to remember I have recently bought an AC/DC tig set. I have welded with a dc set in the past and managed Ti not to bad but this has me baffled. I have argon gas and a number of different tungstens , think I should be using green , i just dont know where to start with the dials. I have a picture of my set and would really appreciate it if you could give me a starting set up for say 5 mm aluminium. Thanks in advance. Guy.

 

[Ragnarok]

i'd go with, ac on, pulse off, pre-flow 1sec, upslope 2.5sec ish if you don't have a pedal, 5mm is gunna need a lot of power say 200amps, down slope 5sec again if you don't have a pedal, post-gas 10sec, ac balance 70-80% (if it's very clean 80%) ac frequency 100hz ish if you have controle over this.
as for tungsten, lanthanated (blue 2%, gold 1.5%), ceriated (grey 2%), and zirconiated (white 2%) are best for aluminium green can be a number of different things, usually a mix of rare earths usually good for ac and dc so would be fine for aluminium.

start off with that and see how it goes

also this guys videos explane stuff in pretty good detail welding tips and tricks settings video

 

[ducati2242]

Thanks for that . I picked the 5 mm out of any number really I could start to practice on 3 or 2 mm I just need a positive start. Thank you.
Oh and as of yet I dont have a foot control. Come to think of it I havent got much control of anything.

 

[Ragnarok]

3mm will weld on 120 ish amps, i always find that 4t trigger latching works much better on aluminium than 2t i like having control over when the slope up starts, foot pedal is well worth it though

 

[ducati2242]

Thank you very much for your time. I have been watching a few videos but U.S. wording has me as baffled as my welder.

 

[Ragnarok]

you're welcome haha that guy knows his stuff and makes great videos in my opinion

 

[pedrobedro]

If you can get the hang of pulse I found it handy on aluminium before I got a pedal. It helps to time your feed into the weld pool and stops it getting too hot and spreading out too wide. Set your pulse frequency so you can see the pulse and the duty to a percentage where the puddle is still molten. I use ceriated which are grey and work on DC and AC, zirconiated are suitable as well.

 

[Ragnarok]

hmm my esab doesn't do ac pulse, does pulse dc but not ac, never thought it'd be useful wouldn't it just mean you'd needed huge tungstens and loads more peak power?

 

[Ragnarok]

also i could imagine some weird stuff happening at various pulse hz and ac frequency hz haha

 

[Mick70RR]

I have a similar machine to this. It's worth pointing out that the AC Balance control works opposite to what you may be used to with a British or American machine. It's typically set to around 30% when welding Aluminium.

 

[ducati2242]

I have a similar machine to this. It's worth pointing out that the AC Balance control works opposite to what you may be used to with a British or American machine. It's typically set to around 30% when welding Aluminium.

Thanks for that I am getting better but still a lot to learn. I thought they were british made welders . http://www.technicalarc.co.uk/index.php/about-us

One other question though is negative or positive earth. I have tried both I think positive is better. Thanks again.

 

[Ragnarok]

for DC it's electrode negative, earth positive, ac is alternating, and when people say 70% ac balance it means 70% electrode negative so your torch always connects to the negative and earth to positive anyway

 

[ducati2242]

for DC it's electrode negative, earth positive, ac is alternating, and when people say 70% ac balance it means 70% electrode negative so your torch always connects to the negative and earth to positive anyway

That makes perfect sense. Thanks again.

 

[Ragnarok]

no problem you'd know if you had it wrong anyway, the tungsten would melt/burn or at least ball up really badly haha

 

[tigler]

Also, have a look at the TIG tutorial on this forum.