Canobi
New Member
- Messages
- 4
- Location
- United Kingdom (Sropshire)
Hi folks
I started welding classes back when I was a teen (late 1980s) but for whatever reason stopped after about two months and never looked at a welder again, until now...
Beginning of summer last year I started assembling a home machine shop and last month started refurbishing my milling machine, which was in desperate need of some serious TLC when I got it.
So far, all has been hunky dory, until I found the need of a press to install a new set of quill bearings.
So far I haven't found one I can buy with the sort of oomph I need small enough to fit in my meagre sized workshop, so I've opted to make my own.
As it happens, a friend of mine is a welder/fabricator who had an old 180A TOPWELD unit taking up storage space and collecting dust which I now have on loan.
After giving it a good clean and the case a de-rust and repaint (well, I just did my mill and had all the gubbins on hand and plenty of paint left over, so thought what the heck) I took it to work and had our lead engineer give it a quick once over to make sure it was ok (we make variable frequency drives and have a section dedicated to high current/voltage drives and motors with a plethora of test equipment).
While not official, the applied tests were at least competent enough to trust I wasn't going to get fried or burn my house down (large drives isn't my area at work but they mentioned measuring load and checking for voltage leakage or something along those lines).
Anyhoo, the welder is now back together and I found a couple pieces if steel derivitive (ie mystery metal) to lay some practice beads on, the first one I did was 1.6mm alloy plate using 1.6mm 6013 rods:
I numbered the beads as I think my hood was tunes too high, couldn't see s**t during the first weld lol. I was aslo taken by surprise at how fast the 1.6mm rods burn down, so it came out terrible but something clicked and realised I had the physics of welding in my head wrong and subsequently the rest of them came out a lot better, if not exactly even or in fact straight and I also put a few holes along the way for good measure.
The second piece is this 2.5mm press formed alloy part that already had quite a few holes in it and plenty of features, which I figured would be an intersting challenge (yep, I'm a jump in at the deep end kinda guy):
I used 2.5mm 6013 this time and was much mor comfortsble with the pace they burned at and after a bit of striking practice (as can be seen by those short beads dotted about), I had a crack at fillet welding around the contours and running over the drops and rises.
I definitely feel much happier about the second plate, even though I put a couple holes in that one too (again due to lingering) but much was learned just from practicing on those two pieces.
Many questions are trapesing about in my head now though and I will likely be seeking answers to those once I've formulated them.
Until then, if any of you seasoned welders out there care for a gander at my efforts I'm all ears to constructive criticism.
(c:
I started welding classes back when I was a teen (late 1980s) but for whatever reason stopped after about two months and never looked at a welder again, until now...
Beginning of summer last year I started assembling a home machine shop and last month started refurbishing my milling machine, which was in desperate need of some serious TLC when I got it.
So far, all has been hunky dory, until I found the need of a press to install a new set of quill bearings.
So far I haven't found one I can buy with the sort of oomph I need small enough to fit in my meagre sized workshop, so I've opted to make my own.
As it happens, a friend of mine is a welder/fabricator who had an old 180A TOPWELD unit taking up storage space and collecting dust which I now have on loan.
After giving it a good clean and the case a de-rust and repaint (well, I just did my mill and had all the gubbins on hand and plenty of paint left over, so thought what the heck) I took it to work and had our lead engineer give it a quick once over to make sure it was ok (we make variable frequency drives and have a section dedicated to high current/voltage drives and motors with a plethora of test equipment).
While not official, the applied tests were at least competent enough to trust I wasn't going to get fried or burn my house down (large drives isn't my area at work but they mentioned measuring load and checking for voltage leakage or something along those lines).
Anyhoo, the welder is now back together and I found a couple pieces if steel derivitive (ie mystery metal) to lay some practice beads on, the first one I did was 1.6mm alloy plate using 1.6mm 6013 rods:
I numbered the beads as I think my hood was tunes too high, couldn't see s**t during the first weld lol. I was aslo taken by surprise at how fast the 1.6mm rods burn down, so it came out terrible but something clicked and realised I had the physics of welding in my head wrong and subsequently the rest of them came out a lot better, if not exactly even or in fact straight and I also put a few holes along the way for good measure.
The second piece is this 2.5mm press formed alloy part that already had quite a few holes in it and plenty of features, which I figured would be an intersting challenge (yep, I'm a jump in at the deep end kinda guy):
I used 2.5mm 6013 this time and was much mor comfortsble with the pace they burned at and after a bit of striking practice (as can be seen by those short beads dotted about), I had a crack at fillet welding around the contours and running over the drops and rises.
I definitely feel much happier about the second plate, even though I put a couple holes in that one too (again due to lingering) but much was learned just from practicing on those two pieces.
Many questions are trapesing about in my head now though and I will likely be seeking answers to those once I've formulated them.
Until then, if any of you seasoned welders out there care for a gander at my efforts I'm all ears to constructive criticism.
(c: