Is this stainless steel?

[SiPMerlin150]

I've raided the back of a fabrication shop for around 25kg of off cuts of varying thickness, size (good sizes, all cut straight!) all of it is mild steel, except for a few pieces that are rather bright and silvery grey, but have a grainy looking surface ( Can't be galavized?) I tested my suspicions and struck a 1 inch weld on one corner, which gave me white smoke, foamy looking weld bead, and the edges of the H.A.Z. have a copious amounts of chalky white sooty substance, and so does the back of the rear of the plate. Some of it is even egg yolk yellow

Any ideas lads?

 

[the snooper]

galv or zinc plated

 

[Paul.]

It sounds like zintec, or galvanised sheet, dont breathe the fumes its not good for you

 

[Hitch]

This is zintec-


The white will be zinc, so its either zintec, or galvanised

 

[tigler]

Try a magnet Some SS is magnetic but many aren't.

 

[SiPMerlin150]

It does look like zintec, never heard of it before but now i know. Thank you!

I shall aquire an appropriate respirator mask before attempting to wore with it

 

[stuvy]

make sure your workshop is well ventilated too a youl end up with a nasty sore throat to start with

 

[Chipper]

Zintec is a fairly even colour. Welds OK, maybe turn it up a bit. No need to grind the coating off, but have mask/ventilation etc. Seems to "pull" round the weld more than normal sheet?

 

[shirazman]

I wouldn't weld this...the fumes are toxic. Scrap it in and buy some steel. Your lungs are more important than a few quid

 

[hotrodder]

I wouldn't weld this...the fumes are toxic. Scrap it in and buy some steel. Your lungs are more important than a few quid

Granted it's worse than the fume from mild steel and a dose of fume fever probably feels a lot worse than the tight chest, headache and sore eyes/nose/throat that can result from over exposure to ozone- welding ally is probably the worst culprit. No welding fume is even close to being healthy but compared to say stainless (hexavalent chromium) the fume from zintec ain't particularly toxic

 

[Shox Dr]

Granted it's worse than the fume from mild steel and a dose of fume fever probably feels a lot worse than the tight chest, headache and sore eyes/nose/throat that can result from over exposure to ozone- welding ally is probably the worst culprit. No welding fume is even close to being healthy but compared to say stainless (hexavalent chromium) the fume from zintec ain't particularly toxic

The company I used to sub' to (that made the 316l SS Extraction canopies, reckoned SS TIG welding was the safest method out there, even going a far to say it didn't give off any type of fume

Despite my protestation. Specially when you're welding .9mm SS you tend to be a lot closer to the fumes