S/H R-Tech 180... working towards Car Body work.

[chrismac]

screw the black knob all the way out anti clockwise and it should shut off the gas flow, then screw it in a little to give a small flow, a flow meter is advisable but not absolutely essential if your welding tomorrow, look at getting one if you do choose to use gas longer term.

 

[Mark 2]

You don't 'need' a knurled roller, I don't use one.
Secondly, looking at the pics, your settings seem low.

 

[Retro Rust]

screw the black knob all the way out anti clockwise and it should shut off the gas flow, then screw it in a little to give a small flow, a flow meter is advisable but not absolutely essential if your welding tomorrow, look at getting one if you do choose to use gas longer term.

Cheers bud yeah I'm going to have a look at it this morning. I'll have a look at the regulator. I thought screwed in was shut but from some videos looks like its the other way round .

 

[Retro Rust]

I'm sure I'll know the answer to this but, I went out and turned the regulator off, opened the gas and theres hardly anything in there!!!

My question is should I bother trying to set up for gas and maybe get a quick go out of this? Or is the likely hood I'll pull the trigger and it'll use it all up before I've tried to weld.

 

[chrismac]

yep that bottle is done, and yes knob screwed out is closed.

 

[Retro Rust]

After learning the Gas was empty I used the 0.8 Flux Core roll with a new 0.8 tip to have a go at messing about with thin metal again.

I took a thick bit of steel after varying degrees of success and tried to run some beeds on this. Not amazing and I think my first one (where my finger is) was my best one.

Settings for this were

Then I turned down to the settings for Gas on 0.8 wire / 1mm plate then messed about until I got to these settings

These seemed to work well. Again I know I'm not steady with my hand or speed but glad not to be blasting holes through it.

Guessing I'm not getting penetration all the time here though?

I might try and get a small bottle of gas from Halfords just to try it (unless its not worth it). Can't quite stretch to the full bottle and rental at the moment. I dont think they will refill mine.

 

[chunkytfg]

By the time youve spent the money on a disposable bottle that'll last about 6 minutes if youre lucky you might swell get an SGS or hobby weld bottle.

I just paid £147 for a SGS 10L bottle with £80 being bottle deposit. You can then get £20 back through this forum for the cost of your first one.

Much cheaper than disposable ones

 

[addjunkie]

The only way you will ever become proficient is to get a bottle gas, and spend time……

 

[Mark 2]

For the fluxcore, turn the voltage up (one more notch than the wire speed)

 

[eddie49]

When swapping between gas and gasless, don't forget to change the polarity of the torch ( inside ) and the work return lead ( on the front panel ).

 

[JOEPRO]

After learning the Gas was empty I used the 0.8 Flux Core roll with a new 0.8 tip to have a go at messing about with thin metal again.

I took a thick bit of steel after varying degrees of success and tried to run some beeds on this. Not amazing and I think my first one (where my finger is) was my best one.

View attachment 499999
Settings for this were
View attachment 499998

Then I turned down to the settings for Gas on 0.8 wire / 1mm plate then messed about until I got to these settings
View attachment 500000

These seemed to work well. Again I know I'm not steady with my hand or speed but glad not to be blasting holes through it.

View attachment 500001

Guessing I'm not getting penetration all the time here though?
View attachment 500002

I might try and get a small bottle of gas from Halfords just to try it (unless its not worth it). Can't quite stretch to the full bottle and rental at the moment. I dont think they will refill mine.

You won't ever have a scenario where you need or want to continously bead weld 1mm thin sheet. It's better with a thin series of tacks. For that thin sheet practice I think you are better to tack weld 2 peices together.

 

[Retro Rust]

You won't ever have a scenario where you need or want to continously bead weld 1mm thin sheet. It's better with a thin series of tacks. For that thin sheet practice I think you are better to tack weld 2 peices together.

I was practicing that too with some success. I was watching videos where people left about a 1mm gap so the weld will fill the gap which makes sense. I also started seeing videos where people said with flux core you want no gap? I dont understand that as much though?

 

[Retro Rust]

So I tried the old Gas bottle. There was enough in it to have a go! Even though I'm only trying it out I can see how much neater the welds are compared the the mess off Flux Core. I'm glad I could see this and the bottle wasnt completely empty as its a bit of an investment to get that first bottle (guessing I'll struggle getting this one refiled )

I didn't spend too long with it but sitting down these were a few runs where I marked the settings down. I've since learned I was using the wrong technique and should be pushing the weld rather than pulling?

I was using 0.8 SIP wire and set the Gas to 15 using the Pee shooter over the welding torch.

in my excitement I started grabing bits of old scrap metal off the welding trolly , leaving a 1mm gap and trying to tack them together. It looks rough but It worked compared to the flux core wire.

I've made a video of this beacuse one thing confused me. The Rtech site says for 1mm using 0.8 wire use 1 on the voltage and 1.5 on the wire speed. This just spat and made a mess (the first weld). Turning up to about 2 - 3 seemed much better. Why is this though? Is it just a voltage thing or a Gas thing? I tried to set a shield up.

 

[premmington]

What warms my heart from the photos is:

When you get it right - get the settings right on MIG welder doing car body work.

It is out with the marker pen and mark the front of the welder where the dials are - I do it...

 

[addjunkie]

Id suggest 3 things
Use instruction book as a guide to start from and tweak settings to where it works, feels right. Isthe wire sliiping in the rollers at the lower setting?
Use your spare hand to support the torch, by putting it on the work, and resting on it, try to stop it waggling all over the shop.
When using gas outside the wind blowing can affect the gas coverage.

 

[premmington]

Id suggest 3 things
Use instruction book as a guide to start from and tweak settings to where it works, feels right. Isthe wire sliiping in the rollers at the lower setting?
Use your spare hand to support the torch, by putting it on the work, and resting on it, try to stop it waggling all over the shop.
When using gas outside the wind blowing can affect the gas coverage.

Wire jams and wire slipage is mostly (not always) down to torch angle while welding.

Lad who helps me - is always moaning about the long 5mtr MIG torch on the welder we patch up cars with - he always got the nozzle apart.

But it never happens to me - as I can get the torch angle right - most of the time.

 

[Turbo]

The recommended settings in the Rtech manual were not correct in my case so I played around on metals of varying thickness until I got a decent weld.
I have the settings written on a bit of duct tape stuck on the welder.