My first attempts

[chunkytfg]

Well below are my first couple of goes with my clarke 135te using disposable argon/co2 bottles.

Starting on the RH bit with my first goes being on the top going right to left.

As you can see it took me a couple of goes to get the sizling bacon noise over snap, crackle and pop! Then it seemed to get better

However on the bottom row rh piece that was where i cranked the power up a notch only to find i'd miss read the settings switchs and gone to setting 3 instead of 2 hence all the holes.

Then the LH bit you will notice i was starting to get it to 'flow' a bit better.

However I cant seem to get the penetration of the metal. all i seem to be doing is putting weld on top of the piece

as shown here(the bits are in the same orientation as the pic above

Any pointers?

Using power setting 2 with wire speed around 6

 

[Wozzaaah]

Any pointers?

Up the gas flow....a lot!

Blobby, dirty, porous welds like those are a sure sign of inadequate gas coverage, those disposable cylinder regs need to be pretty much fully open to achieve a decent flow rate.
Are you welding indoors or out?

 

[chunkytfg]

Ahh okay. i'll give that a go and see what happens.

I'm welding indoors so the gas blowing away isnt an issue.

I do have a AP ferrimax7 bottle but i'm waiting on a regulator which should be here tommorow.

I know i'm tending to hold the tip at quite an angle and i'm sturggling with the concept of holding it virtually upright aswell as pushing the tip away from me as pulling seems more natural.

I'll give it another go and see what happens.

Wish me luck...lol

 

[chunkytfg]

talk about making a diference upping the gas!!!

This was them the minute i upped the gas

Much nicer IMO and it even penetrated

and then i tried joining a couple of bits

started in the middle and then did the edges

Again it penetrated quite well although my exercises to help torch control although seemed to work some of them didnt penetrate as i'd like as i was moving the torch a bit quick.

So what does the expert collective rekon then?

 

[Wozzaaah]

I reckon that's a massive improvement!
Sort your angle of dangle out and they'll be spot on .

 

[chunkytfg]

Superb.

Just got to finish cutting the rust out the car and then i can think about welding some metal back in.

I even bought 3 bottles of disposable gas to get me going and i'm still on the first!

 

[chunkytfg]

Okay so moving on i've had another go today.

Getting there i would say.

Struggled to stop the butt weld from dripping and creating holes but the other lines came out very well imo

what you think?

I even got realtively goot conistant penetration.

 

[fingers99]

Bit less power on the butt, methinks.

 

[malcolm]

Just a wee note about images - for those of us living on a farm in the middle of nowhere (and whose internet connection was recently struck by lightening) your pictures take about 2 minutes to load. I don't normally bother waiting for photobucket - for us internet challenged people loading pics on the forum works much much faster.

I'm going to hazard a wild guess. Your touch should be no more than 20 degrees from perpendicular to the work, and you are moving too quickly. Move your head around so you can see the weld pool and keep the pool going as you move the torch. Always weld to the edge of the pool so you maintain a continuous weld.

I'll stick my neck out a bit and suggest pull the torch rather than push for anything less than 2mm.

 

[chunkytfg]

Sorry about that malcolm. my apologies.

as for the welding. cheers for the tips. runn out of scrap for the moment so will need to replenish before tyring your tips out.

as for less power on the butt weld then the welder is already on the lowest setting.