at least I never blew holes in it

[Geodawg]

Guys,

be gentle now this is my first attempt with gas, and although it's not pretty I'm happy in the fact that I never blew holes in the metal previously I was using gasles with no luck, kept blowing holes in everything.

a couple of questions, these welds were done with 0.6 wire on full power.
1. should I use 0.8 for this gauge of metal ( reckon it's at least 3mm)
2. should I try and get a spot light on my work, as I find it hard to follow the line I'm working on
3. should I just go in a straight line till I get it right

 

[norlander]

You are may be on the limit for 0.6-hard to say from the pics-but I was doing 3mm with it yesterday, OK-sometimes I did think 0.8 would have been better but then I was also joining thinner stuff to the 3mm, and anyway I'm a lazy git and could not be Rd to change the set up.
I think you have to watch the puddle closely when on the limit with 0.6 to check penetration-I tend to weave a bit to sort of slow the run down to aid pen and maybe help to flatten the bead a bit.
Yes, you sometimes do need to get good light on the job, sometimes if you are new to welding, the arc/puddle sucks all your focus in on it and you lose track of where you are going because of that, get a bit of scrap and chalk or felt tip some lines on it then practise following them by keeping one eye on the arc and t'other on the joint.
Try this: hold your thumb up in the OK sign, hold your thumb up in front of you about torch distance then pick an object to imaginary weld.Get your thumb in focus and follow the line of the imaginary joint, then switch to having the joint in focus and following the joint line with your thumb out of focus.
You should then be able to weld your clamps to every job and every job to the work bench no probs-seriously though-give that a go and see how you get on.
On the blowing holes with the flux core- or any wire set up-in fact any welding process really where you cannot go to lower settings, try pulsing-ie just a series of continuous tacks-you'll find a pace for the job pretty quickly-I think thats how the car restoration lads tackle some of their jobs.
Make sure you get a good earth connection-mig is very sensitive to that-well-mine is.
Stick those test bits in the vice and give them a good belting-that will let you know if the welds were good.

 

[CRB]

As Norlander says a good light will help. My weld was quite good, but not really where it should have been, I lost track of the join in concentrating on the puddle.

The short tack technique worked really well for me, joining new 0.9mm to 25 year old ?mm van wheelarch. Shame I screwed it up by not being able to follow the joint.

 

[Geodawg]

I see what you mean about concentrating on the puddle, that's deffo one of the things I know I'm doing. Norlander I'll deffo try the exercise with the thumb, and also the lines... CRB I'll give the short tack technique a shot as well. thanks for the feedback and tips guys.

 

[CRB]

http://www.mig-welding.co.uk/thin-metal.htm

One of the first pages I read, backed up by, and added to by, a lot of great pointers from those with more experience than I.

 

[mfletch]

0.8 is needed infact I use 0.8 all the time even on car body panels

Yes get some light on the work push the wire it's easier to see what your doing

Looks like you need more amps

 

[Geodawg]

0.8 is needed infact I use 0.8 all the time even on car body panels

Yes get some light on the work push the wire it's easier to see what your doing

Looks like you need more amps

I'm sure I was at my highest setting (I'll double check that tonight) my beads probably look higher than they should be because I went over them a couple of times due to them looking a bit crap, on my first attempt. I'll get a new bit of scrap on the go tonight and have another go, and hopefully do a bead in one go.

 

[Kent]

It looks like you cannot see the seam or the weld as its being done and just guessing via direction and start point. Get some flat sheet in 3mm and fill it with parallel runs under good light and see how things look from that, it will show if its light that is the issue or the fact your guessing. Only then move to joints. I often wear reading glasses these days and keep my lens clean, when I was in my teens and twenties I recon I could see through any spattered-up old lens in a dark room
0.8mm is the do all wire

 

[Geodawg]

I often wear reading glasses these days and keep my lens clean, when I was in my teens and twenties I recon I could see through any spattered-up old lens in a dark room
0.8mm is the do all wire

I hear you mate, the old eyes aint what they used to be lol, I'm also wearing reading glasses these days, I use them under my visor as well. And I get what your saying about guessing. But hey ho it's all part of the fun of learning something new. I dont want to become a pro, just want to be able to do some patching on my T4 when the time comes (body work is pretty good, which is just as well as it will take me a while to be confident enough to go near her with my mig lol)

 

[mfletch]

I use a cheater lens it fits in front of your mask lens it's a lot better than wearing glasses

You can get them of ebey just pick the correct strength

 

[Jan]

Please tell me more about these cheater lenses. I'm short sighted, but due to rapidly advancing years I find I also need reading glasses - especially if I remember to slip in my contacts. Fortunately the strength is not very critical so £ shop ones are all I've bothered to buy.
About 30 years ago (before any £ shops existed) my wife was ripped off by a registered optician for £80 to supply reading glasses that were little better than the ones I buy today.

 

[norlander]

Please tell me more about these cheater lenses. I'm short sighted, but due to rapidly advancing years I find I also need reading glasses - especially if I remember to slip in my contacts. Fortunately the strength is not very critical so £ shop ones are all I've bothered to buy.
About 30 years ago (before any £ shops existed) my wife was ripped off by a registered optician for £80 to supply reading glasses that were little better than the ones I buy today.

http://www.migtigarc.co.uk/Welding_Helmets/welding_helmets.html scroll down page to 19th item or so, note also the wee light to clip to your helmet (don't start-the usual culprits know who they are).

 

[Geodawg]

that wee light looks interesting, anybody use one?

 

[Kent]

I hear you mate, the old eyes aint what they used to be lol, I'm also wearing reading glasses these days, I use them under my visor as well. And I get what your saying about guessing. But hey ho it's all part of the fun of learning something new. I dont want to become a pro, just want to be able to do some patching on my T4 when the time comes (body work is pretty good, which is just as well as it will take me a while to be confident enough to go near her with my mig lol)

Yeah, just use them glasses under the visor. Seriously you need to see what your doing well to weld well and I bet either your eyes are bad or your hiding the weld pool from sight during the weld via the torch being a guess this is often all as simple as forgetting to think were your torch and head need to be through all the weld long. The T fillet on the second picture looks like a dead give away on that count, welds can never achieve much strength without contact with both pieces being joined, the T4 wont thank you for not looking

 

[Geodawg]

I think it's more me hiding the weld pool mate, although I do wear glasses to read and I do feel they help me see what I'm doing welding wise, I think what you and the rest of the guys are saying is right, I'm watching the puddle too closely and not seeing where the joint is. I'll need to work on the angle I watch from and watch where I'm going... as everyone says, practice practice practice. The reason id did some joints is because that was the only scrap I had at hand. I'll try and source some flat bar or something to just run a load of beads....

thanks again to everyone for the tips n tricks etc its much appreciated.

 

[mfletch]

The cheater lens is great I got mine of eBay

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MAGNIFYIN...t=LH_DefaultDomain_3&var=&hash=item1c38a83e6e

 

[CaptainCalamity]

Ahhh the wandering hand! The best advice I have ever been given with MIG is to focus on the pool more than the arc. There's a job at work that has a 16 inch butt weld, I used to always wander off (not helped by the fact there's a press tooling mark 5 mm away from the weld, and I'd usually end up welding that! ). You'll get the feeling for it eventually, having a decent mask helps too, just focus more on the pool rather than the arc

 

[norlander]

I forgot, try different angles of attack with the torch-you can get away with that a lot easier with mig, and use two hands to steady the torch, I sometimes do a dry run to make sure I won't foul anything, this sometimes helps with staying on line- thats another great thing about mig the non live torch.
A few wimmin have told me I've got a wandering hand but I seem to weld OK all tha same.

 

[Geodawg]

Ok guys, changed my torch the yesterday to euro connector (with a lot of help from Tiggy_Dorset via his how to http://www.mig-welding.co.uk/forum/threads/euro-conversion-gas-solenoid.29352/#post-545901) so did a few more beads tonight with 0.6 wire just to test the torch more than anything. I think I'll be getting some 0.8 as I checked guage of that box section and it's 3mm. I managed to keep a straight line also changed the settings on my auto darkening which has helped a lot lol ****** thing was too dark (explains some of my errors). but back to the welds. how do these look for penetration? I had the machine on max and speed at around 8. did some slow and some fast. let me know what you think.