new to MIGing

[Kwik]

in fact... new to welding. closest i have got is soldering.

im from london, and i am soon to be building a single seat racing car, i have all the plans and everything all thats left now is to make the thing, but i have never welded. sounds crazy i know, but your wrong.

because i need ideas for practice projects that are single seat race car related, that arnt too big and complicated but good at practicing.the main bulk of the chassis is made from square 7/8ths " x 18g mild steel, welded seem.

right, can someone convert that to english, i assume 7/8ths of an inch to be the height/width, but the 18g?

but thats mainly whats in the car, 80ft of it and so preferable would like to make something out of that rather than practicing on thinner or thicker materials...

also, whats the recommended amps for the welder. the book im taking reference from is around 48 years old and the 19g thing might be a bit outdated etc.

chris

 

[rkde]

hmmm

7/8 = 22.23mm
18g = 1.2mm wall thickness generally you may want to use 16g = about 1.6mm

g = gauge or SWG standard wire gauge look to convert g or swg to mm on the net.

As for a welder a clarke 160 argon/co2 mix or just co2 will be fine with 0.80mm wire but your going to have to practise a lot or you could always learn to arc/mma and that will be fine if not a little messy to start with

You will want to look at the BIVA guide to build your own car as they got strict on self builds, you will be able to download a copy from ACE, if you can't find it click on my link below and on the RH side of my page there is a list of links. If your book is that old you may have to make changes to get the car on the road

Soldering is nothing like welding except a little molten metal

 

[Kwik]

i understand all the rules to get it on the road, basically, the SVA test, or IVA. the book is "high speed low cost" by Allan Staniforth, and explains how to build a single seater car for hill climbs, it was never intended for the road but i am planning a few modifications to the chassis and pick up points to make it more viable, its only the making of it i will have any trouble with.

i should also say its going to be made in my back garden, so outside and slightly windy, i was thinking gasless welding would be better in the windier conditions? and my budget for a welder is between £200 and £250, dont really want to go over that.

you suggested ARC? its it easier? as neatness isn't a problem if i have a grinder at hand, and the chassis will be covered and really i want whatever is cheapest. think of it as a locost project, tools included :P

 

[derekm]

I taught myself mig modifying racing car tubular chassis 16g and 18g. Its relatively easy just get some scrap bits of tube and give yourself a full day of playing around with it, methodically experim enting with the settings before trying to "make something". A 160 amp gas set is more than ample. ( I started with one) 0.8 wire about 2/3rd power. 18g is slightly more tricky, practice on 16g then move to 18g.

 

[Kwik]

(as a pre note: this is coppied from another forum where i purposely took pics with unrelated gadgets and stuff in it to take the mick out of another member, so ignore them )

Thursday, for me was spent shopping, i had earnt a fair bit of money over the last 4 months working and with no outgoings i had near enough £1000. so i done what any 18 year old teenager would. i bought a dirty big welder with clamps and mask, and a dirty big angle grinder with spare grinding disks and cutting disk, result!

so, heres a few pics of my new toys

so i bought a lot of stuff and spent a lot of money. so what you ask am i going to do with all of this? well im keeping it a secret in case its a massive flop, so your gunna have to wait.




yesterday, i thought i should have a little play around with it. so i drove down to a B&Q warehouse and picked up the only bits of steel they had, 2 metres of 1cmx1cm box section with a 1mm wall thickness. seriously?

thats all they had, which threw my idea out the window of building a nice stand for when i order in proper amounts of metal to keep it off the damp ground. damn.

so on the drive back i was thinking of something to make, something that i could try out all my equipment, not too hard, not too simple. a square !!

no, i decided however to make 2 frames where i can fix some plastic sheet or heat proof fabric of some sort to act as a spark shield for when i weld other stuff. so i cut out my metal into 20cm (inside length) sections so make a square where i can then fix some form of material in the middle. here are the pics of what i done.

this is my first ever set of welds with this machine, and second ever time welding, i played around with the settings after blowing threw about 5 million times and eventually do to a stage where i was making strong-ish welds.

i grinded down the edges of them to see how they actually welded and how it was doing and it looks pretty good to me, it may not look pretty but try as hard as i could i could not brake it apart, tomorrow im gunna try standing on the finished square to see if it can take my weight.

so thats my last 2 days, i would have liked to have done more but i took so long setting up and figuring out how to cut it i didn't actually have a lot of time... and now my back hurts.

also bare in mind that it was welded outside in my garden without a proper workbench and using gasless welding wire which splatters a lot and is naturally un-neat. so current MIG welders, what do you think?

chris