My first go at welding

[cojonesdeloro]

Eyup chaps, been lurking around for a wile thought i would post up and say hi, had a go at my first welds today, was sh1ting myself i would burn big holes in my bike frame, i'm working on a Fireblade monoshock convertion on my cb900f, the plan was to tack all my bits together then have a pro tig them up, after a few practice welds on some spare plate i bit the bullet and had a go, what you lot think? i must say i'm quite pleased with how i did for a first go, it took me around half an hour to get the welder set up for this, my welder is the cheep as chips Powercraft job you see on ebay, i know it has a rep for being no good but i must say as a beginner it didnt give me much trouble, the gun on my welder is not a live feed as some have reported so control is ok, there is a fare bit of splatter but my welds look good and strong, i joined a bit of box section to some flat plate with a couple of tack welds then ran a weld down one side, after it had cooled i put it on the garage floor and hit it with a hammer very hard a few times and it is solid, here are some pics of the project and the test bit, any advice or comment would be great i think i will keep at it and when i can get a good looking weld do the rest myself.

Test bit

Top mount

Bottom mount

Cheers.

Daz A.

 

[Haze]

bit more power i think

 

[irondarren]

yes more power captain. try weaving a little as well, and relax when you are welding, the more relaxed you are the better it seems to turn out

 

[cojonesdeloro]

Thanks for the advice chaps, i had the welder on the lowest setting for this work, i tryed it on max but the weld just bounced off the steel in to balls of slag, i went down to lowest with the wire feed on about half way and this is what i used, more power then? i'll try upping it to middle setting and see how i go.

Cheers.

Daz A.

 

[irondarren]

Dont forget as you increase the power you will need to increase the wire speed. 3mm thick and about 120amps will give nice penetration and a good welding speed

 

[Wozzaaah]

Clean your metal a bit more as well, it looks like you tried welding to painted steel which makes it a lot harder. For steel of that thickness you'll have to crank it up pretty high.

 

[cojonesdeloro]

Thanks again for the advice lads, the steel i used is bare i think the pics just look like the steel is painted i gave all the weld surfices a clean with a wire brush attatchment on my drill first, the wire that is in the welder is 0.6mm i'm told i may have better welds with some 0.8mm so will try this as well, thanks for the comments i need all the help i can get, enjoying the work though, there is something quite satisfying about welding.

Darren A.

 

[Haze]

i think 0.6 mm will be fine for that, try to use a little bit too much power as oppose to a little bit too little, if you start making holes then stop when a hole appears when its still small, let it cool and fill/patch it in, and definately the cleaner the better.

 

[Rich_GSX]

Hello

I'm totally new here and will shortly be buying my first mig welder to practice on, only done a bit of arc welding up to now. I too am wanting to do bike frame mods and the first thing will be new shock mountings. Fair play to you for having a go.

Just my opinion, but I've seen a lot of shock mods and I think you might want to consider bracing the top mount. You're quite far out from the frame rail and so there are a lot of catilever forces acting on that joint. I've seen similar ones braced like the pic below

 

[cojonesdeloro]

Thanks for the advice Rich, you are dead right m8, i intend to brace the top mount to the main frame rails with tube, i'll post pics soon as i have it finished, been reading Streetfighter mag since issue 14 so have hundreds of frame projects to go on, if anyone is interested have a look at cb1100f.net in the performance tech forum for the full story on this project.

Cheers.

Daz A.

 

[cojonesdeloro]

Here is the top mount brace tacked in, i went up on the power and am getting much better penatration but my seams are still lumpy and will have to be cleaned up a little before powder coat.

Cheers

Daz A.

 

[shenion]

One nice thing about those old bikes is a steel frame. If it was newer, you'd be messing with alum Have an '86 ZX600 that I need to reweld a crack in one of the steering head gussets, should be easy job.

My brother has a 96 CBR900. Lead sled compared to my ZX6R (120 lbs lighter and same power )

Looks good, probably hard to angle the torch and see inside the frame. I usually use my left hand to brace the torch. I.e. for the vertical weld on the monoshock mount; grab top of mount and brace torch with thumb. Have gotten decent on blind welds just listening