Well I've got my welder, got my mask and I'm almost ready to give welding a go. Just wondering if there's a guide to which wire to use with which metal and which gas? Also, how do I identify the type of metal I'm welding to?
identifying metals is quite easy, usually u can tell by what kind of thing it is your working on, most common is steel or varients thereof, for mild steel you should be using argon and co2 mix, or plain co2, the latter being less effective but still workable none the less.
unless your welding something really strange the above information is probably correct, and its advisable to start/practise on mild steel, then with the skills and information you learn from your time then apply it to others.
Cheers Haze Well I've got some brackets I need to bend and weld and I assume they're made of steel but not sure. Also got a garden gate I need to shorten and I assume it's made of iron That's my question, how can I tell
It's probably steel if it's not stainless steel, brass or aluminium. Easy to tell those apart from steel. Final alternative is cast iron which is a pain to weld as it's very brittle. It's used in castings as it's name suggests.
Anything else will likely be mild steel. If it is fairly heavy, you can stick a magnet to it (without using glue) and it's gone rusty then it'll be mild steel. Mild steel wire only seems to be available to DIY welders in one grade, and the best all round gas for mild steel is Argoshield light if you will mostly be welding below 150 amps.
Don't worry too much about the distinction between iron and steel. Iron hasn't been available for ages - wrought iron garden gates tend to be made of mild steel.
A common mistake is trying to weld very thin stuff, such as bodywork, with 0.8mm wire; you end up blowing holes through it & cursing the machine! Thicker wire requires more current to melt it = burn through on very thin stuff.
Likewise, thinner wire, 0.6mm, needs less current to fuse it; so, trying to weld thicker sections with 0.6mm wire (above 3mm) means you have to increase the amps for the thicker material which 'overloads' (for want of a better word) thin wire & results in equally poor welds.
weldequip