Teething probs with new welder

[TheMitch]

I have a TIG 200WSM with pulse and 3 way switch for higher frequency's. I just been messing about with it tonight to try find appropriate settings for a car sill. Listed below is what I'm using and settings.

1.6mm grey tip tungsten
1.0mm filler rod
1.0mm steel sheet
5 Ceramic Cup
Pure argon (disposable bottle) just tap no regulator
30amp
flat line no pulse

My problem is tungsten burning down and awful unstable arc. From reading on here it looks like what causes this problem is gas flow. Am I going to have to quickly work out how many turns on the tap for gas flow or will the welder distribute the gas accordingly when the gas tap is fully open???? Should I use a larger cup????
my attempts left a kind of black looking weld at times. Managed to get about 2 decent runs a few inches each with filler rod but like I say the tungsten is burning down so fast. Quite annoying as my tig welding has always been good only when ive been using a system already set up. Now im having to set up my own system and just want to get the setup proper as argon aint cheap lol

 

[zardoz]

How were you at TIG welding before you got this machine ? I mean, have you already got past the super beginer stage ?

As for the gas. I think with no reg bottles you have to turn them fully open. I am sure you know this, but I will say it anyway. Disposables are very expensive, especially for TIG, where the weld speed it a quarter of a MIG speed, the gas usage is correspondingly three or four times higher per inch of weld.!

Lastly. pictures are worth a thousand words. Please do not worry about anyone mocking your weld attempts. This will not happen on this Forum. We have ALL been there belive me. Seriously, with pics its a lot easier to diagnose anything like this. You can upload directly, you don't need to put them on somewhere like Flickr or Photobucket.

 

[TheMitch]

teething....

I used to work in the electronics industry in SMT repairs so when I had a go at TIG I found an instant knack to it but like I said before. It was always using a system already set up. What's the super beginner stage lol I will get some pictures uploaded. What u want to see?
1. a weld attempt
2. state of the tungsten
3 settings

one thing I was thinking about was it recommends on some sites that welding for my given metal parameters I should be using DCEN.
So torch should be plugged into ground (- or earth )= the ground clamp sign

ground clamp croc clip should be plugged into torch sign?
which = DCEN = straight polarity?

if this is the case then what I have done is plugged tig torch into tig torch sign and earth croc clip into earth clamp sign. so that would be DC + reverse polarity? Which in itself is 1 problem? Am I right or way off? Please gimme ur input guys. Ignore the actual dial settings in the picture. that was just way it came out the box.

 

[hotrodder]

DC tig is always* DCEN aka straight polarity. You'd hope that the socket with a pic of a tig torch is the -ve one (must resist the urge to make comments of the cheapnese/chinglish variety). If the polarity is wrong the tungsten will melt but it'll melt cleanly as it's protected by the argon. If there's a gas problem (leaks/wrong gas/disposibles 99% of the time) the tungsten that's white hot while welding will oxidise immediately, spit tiny bits of itself everywhere, burn back and the end will turn into a blackened charred mess. Both scenarios will result in an unstable arc, moreso the later

Pics of 1 and 2 are the most useful ones

On a pence/litre basis disposibles are at least 3 times more expensive than a proper refillable cylinder. In practice they're even worse as even if you get them working they WILL run out part way through a weld and make a mess. Total waste of time
Check out the gas suppliers list and various argon offers in the shielding gas forum

* there are some exceptions but pretty rare because around 2/3 of the arcs heat occurs at the +ve terminal i.e. DCEP puts more heat into the tungsten and less into the work

 

[Jim Davey]

Silly one, but you have got a bottle of argon on and not an argon/CO2 mixture by mistake?