shenion
Tool Pack Rat
- Messages
- 7,586
- Location
- Stone Mountain, GA USA
My experience with welding has been with the cheap MAP gas O2 welders (gives about 10 minutes on $8 can of O2.) Worked fine for brazing or very light welding. But by the time you got it adjusted and going you were worried about running out of O2. I was able to weld the cracked flanges back on my motorcycle headers, so it served its purpose.
Recently picked up a Clarke 130E MIG.
I played with the flux wire. Did ok, but was hard to see and made a mess. I could have used it, but wanted to try gas/MIG.
So picked up a tank. They misheard what i wanted and gave me pure Argon.
So put in 0.030 solid wire, hooked up gas and started playing
Could not get any thing to work right. The best i could do was lay a big caterpillar with almost no penetration. Getting the current up would vaporise the wire right up to the tip. Still no penetration, was filling the tip with metal, spattering, and ended up overheating the tip. No matter what the wire speed or voltage setting, the arc/weld did not look right.
Thought it might be the gas. Had read that pure argon has less penetration than argon/co2. Still the references I saw still showed decent welds with pure argon.
Was welding probably 0.090 steel. The welder should have had no problem. Tried an old piano hinge (thinner). Same thing and iT I raised the current it just blew through and still would not lay a bead. Lower current and it would leave balls everywhere.
Searched forums and other sites. Could not find anything. Suspected the cheap Harbor Freight wire.
Then stumbled on this gem: "When switching from flux core to solid wire, be sure to switch the polarity to EP".
Of all the stupid things. I switched polarity; set the unit to what I estimated the right speed/voltage. Then laid a beautiful bead. One tick up on the wire speed, and a perfect weld with the right penetration.
Oh well, not wasted time. I guess all the practice with it backwards did teach me a lot about seeing/hearing getting the setting right.
Now I can fix the broken brackets on my Ol' GPz and add the needed supports to my trailer.
Thanks to all in these forums. This has been a great resource, I have learned a lot.
Will probably stick with the pure argon. Will let me try aluminum. Now the penetration seems fine as is.
Recently picked up a Clarke 130E MIG.
I played with the flux wire. Did ok, but was hard to see and made a mess. I could have used it, but wanted to try gas/MIG.
So picked up a tank. They misheard what i wanted and gave me pure Argon.
So put in 0.030 solid wire, hooked up gas and started playing
Could not get any thing to work right. The best i could do was lay a big caterpillar with almost no penetration. Getting the current up would vaporise the wire right up to the tip. Still no penetration, was filling the tip with metal, spattering, and ended up overheating the tip. No matter what the wire speed or voltage setting, the arc/weld did not look right.
Thought it might be the gas. Had read that pure argon has less penetration than argon/co2. Still the references I saw still showed decent welds with pure argon.
Was welding probably 0.090 steel. The welder should have had no problem. Tried an old piano hinge (thinner). Same thing and iT I raised the current it just blew through and still would not lay a bead. Lower current and it would leave balls everywhere.
Searched forums and other sites. Could not find anything. Suspected the cheap Harbor Freight wire.
Then stumbled on this gem: "When switching from flux core to solid wire, be sure to switch the polarity to EP".
Of all the stupid things. I switched polarity; set the unit to what I estimated the right speed/voltage. Then laid a beautiful bead. One tick up on the wire speed, and a perfect weld with the right penetration.
Oh well, not wasted time. I guess all the practice with it backwards did teach me a lot about seeing/hearing getting the setting right.
Now I can fix the broken brackets on my Ol' GPz and add the needed supports to my trailer.
Thanks to all in these forums. This has been a great resource, I have learned a lot.
Will probably stick with the pure argon. Will let me try aluminum. Now the penetration seems fine as is.