Production welders

[NTwoO]

I saw that when I was a teenager and one of my schoolmates used his fathers welder to light his cigarettes.

It is still a mistery why one couldn't insert a piece of mild steel into the clamp and do it on the mild steel...

 

[Sparkey]

I know people that would charge their lads if they did that - price of whatever they have damaged + 25%!

Yea that's understandable... in our plant we take an offcut or a scrapped faulty pedal to tack on...easy to clean up when the shift ends, you just pick it up and throw it in the scrap bin!

Ah, light your fag with the torch......those were the days...
You had to be carefull when your mask fell down tho...

Blimey!.You work with some proper animals by the looks of it.

Myes, you have to be slightly crazy in da coconut to be a prod welder....people hurrying you up aaaaall the time! more! faster!!
You really have to be a strong person to deal with that EVERY day...
Next week our quota's are tightened again (parts we do per hour) the plant found out we could go even faster!

 

[Robotstar5]

Latest episode....

Carried out a routine maintenance on one of the welding booths, welder saw me couple of days later and said his welder was much better now.

Told him I'd replaced the 1.0mm tip with 0.8mm tip as I find they work much better on 0.8mm wire

 

[Sparkey]

Haha!That's not too bad Stu! I've seen worse...
So you use both 1.0 and 0.8 mm wire at your plant?


Edit: today i took one of our aluminium jigs from the shelf to bash out a load of parts quickly.... there seems to be a welder who thinks he can weld an alu jig with the machine setup for steel.....there was something hanging loose on the jig and he tried desperately to weld it back on...worst part is: it isn't the first time he tries!! God, i would be ashamed of myself.... (i'll try to get a pic of the mess he made, if i can...)

 

[Robotstar5]

So you use both 1.0 and 0.8 mm wire at your plant?

It was all 1.0mm 'til the company moved a line in from Germany building Land Rover seats which had been passed off / crash tested etc. with 0.8mm welding and it would be too expensive to go through the process again with 1.0mm welding so we have to put up with mixed wire sizes and be CAREFUL!

On of the "welders" broke a dynafile and tried to weld the damaged aluminium body with no success I've got past being annoyed at the attitude of "it's only company property" even though a dynafile costs the best part of £100 and some have been broken within days of being issued

 

[Sparkey]

Yes, i understand what you're saying...the way our jigs are treated is horrible!
They already are crap, and if no one even bothers to clean them before they put them away makes me mad!

Quick question...can cold weather and temperatures below zero affect the shielding gas tanks outside of the plant?
I coulden't squeeze out one decent weld out of my oerli today! this morning it was - 8.....

 

[Robotstar5]

Quick question...can cold weather and temperatures below zero affect the shielding gas tanks outside of the plant?
I coulden't squeeze out one decent weld out of my oerli today! this morning it was - 8.....

Our tanks are external, seperate Argon & CO2 which are mixed inside, our welders haven't had any problems but we have not been below freezing here yet.

We nearly had a free gas delivery Saturday, the tanker driver realised he should have gone to the factory next door when he had trouble connecting the delivery pipe

 

[Sparkey]

Yes, 92% co2 and 8% argon...
All i can say, 'tis friggin cold here and my welder didn't work like it should...

Our plant is moving a line from Spain at the mo...

 

[Robotstar5]

All i can say, 'tis friggin cold here and my welder didn't work like it should.

Are you sure it wasn't your hands shaking with the cold? , it was down to 11°C in the maintenance shop one of the days last week, our boss comes down from his nice warm office for 5 mins and can't see a problem

 

[Sparkey]

Hehe!my hands never shake!
Will keep you updated how it went tomoz...see ya later, 'tis sleepy time for sparks now, i'm on earlies....

 

[Jackel]

He doesn't like to hang about does he

 

[Delgado]

Hi Sparky, not sure about shielding gas freezing , although a quick google search has revealed that Argon freezes at -199.3 degrees (and actually boils a few degrees higher at -185.9 degrees) so I doubt its that. Judging by some of the fotos you've posted of your welds, my money's on sabotage by one of the other welders Our workshop here doesn't have heating so we were all working in sub zero degrees today (not much fun when you have to use the band saw all day), although it was kind of funny to watch some of my colleagues inventing reasons to heat treat already straight fabrications, and as "luck" would have it, the 500tonne hydraulic press mysteriously stopped working

Ps, I have a tool that I call "the size 10 (or size 44 where you are)" that seems to work surprisingly well when fixing broken machines

 

[runnach]

Quick question...can cold weather and temperatures below zero affect the shielding gas tanks outside of the plant?
I coulden't squeeze out one decent weld out of my oerli today! this morning it was - 8.....

Sparklets, as gas cools, pressure drops, as gas heats, obviously it expands, although I imagine you have proper flow rate at business end? If your prob is due to pressure drop due to extreme cold, may I suggest you go outside and stare at gas holders with your perma-de-frosters till pressure increases

 

[Sparkey]

Hi Sparky, not sure about shielding gas freezing , although a quick google search has revealed that Argon freezes at -199.3 degrees (and actually boils a few degrees higher at -185.9 degrees) so I doubt its that. Judging by some of the fotos you've posted of your welds, my money's on sabotage by one of the other welders Our workshop here doesn't have heating so we were all working in sub zero degrees today (not much fun when you have to use the band saw all day), although it was kind of funny to watch some of my colleagues inventing reasons to heat treat already straight fabrications, and as "luck" would have it, the 500tonne hydraulic press mysteriously stopped working

Ps, I have a tool that I call "the size 10 (or size 44 where you are)" that seems to work surprisingly well when fixing broken machines

Stay away from my kit with that!!!!
Lol, you could try the 500 tonne...

No probs terr, the gas is working fine now! Now there's too much snow to go to work....

ps:i mixed up the gas percentages in my previous post.... it's the other way around...

 

[Robotstar5]

This is what eventually happens by tapping the shroud to remove spatter, hanging the torch in a piece of tube welded to the bench does not help either!



Welder complaining about shroud falling off. Torch is Binzel MB25AK for info

 

[Sparkey]

I never do that....

Aye...i'll 'fess up....actually it has become kind of a tic to tap the torch to the side of my welding table... and when i'm stressed i'll tap even more, which means almost every day...and yes, i also have a nice piece of tube welded to the side of my table to put the torch in...

Can you help me Dr Robo??????

 

[Robotstar5]

Can you help me Dr Robo??????

Hi Sparkey, as you are not very impressed with your maintenance guys I recommend you tap the shroud more, also try spraying anti-spatter on the feed rolls, this really annoys them!

 

[Sparkey]

Why on earth do i want to spray anti spatter on my wire feed rolls????
I might not be impressed with our maintenance crew but the weldors in your factory don't impress me either... spraying anti spatter on there will make a right mess of your kit!

Hehe, and i DON'T want to annoy our maintenance guys, they already have too much work so i'd like to stay friends with them! at least they will help me when i need them...and vice versa ofcourse!

 

[Robotstar5]

Why on earth do i want to spray anti spatter on my wire feed rolls????

That's what I wondered when I had to clean a horrible copper coloured mess from the feed rolls on one of the weldsets!

 

[Sparkey]

Right, update on the gas probs......
We had a gas leak! They found out about it last time we had gas trouble for about a week!
Apparantly the internet link with Air Liquide wasn't working.... I've told them several times we had a problem with the mixture but.....hey, i'm only an operator, i don't get payed to think.....
Working a treat now!

Got my very own apprentice at the mo!
He welded a copper jig shut already this week...
Hey, we all have to learn!