Welding on side

[123]

If it try and weld a piece of metal at 90 degrees, all that happens is the molton weld drops of the floor and i end up with loads of marbles on the floor and no weld on the work piece. If i turn the wire speed up, it sounds too fast and the weld looks awful.
Also (possible related) i cant get my welder to sound like bacon. I get good, strong enough welds but the sound is more of a buzz and the occasional arc (say every 1 - 2 seconds).
What am i doing wrong?

 

[rusty69bus]

i cant get my welder to sound like bacon

sounds like you might need to turn up the power as well as the wire feed.
first things first get a couple of bits of the same metal and practice lap welds flat first to get the bacon sound then go from there

 

[123]

The settings im using are:
wire speed - 7
power setting - 2 max

Im welding 2mm mild steel. Do i really need to go higher? i thought the welder would weld up to 5mm and if i turn the power up, it doesnt leav much left.

 

[rusty69bus]

still say the same, get it welding right first on some practice metal then go from there,if it doesn't work right there it won't work at 90 degrees

The settings im using are:
wire speed - 7
power setting - 2 max

means buger all if you don't mention what machine it is

 

[shenion]

rusty, his profile says Clarke 151

If it is 0.6mm wire, the wire speed will be real fast and not have a good sound.

Still sounds like you have the speed too low. 0.6mm wire sounds frantic on higher settings. I only use it on 1mm steel. Everything else I use 0.8 0r 0.9mm.

Also, what gas are you using? CO2 will not have a clean sound.

 

[rusty69bus]

thanks shenion, i didn't check the profile.

 

[peterd51]

Hi,

for 2mm MS on my 151 TE I'd be using 0.6 wire, speed 5 - 6, power '2 min' or possibly '2 max', with co2 gas.

It's basically a case of controlling the weld pool and teasing it along before it gets chance to burn through but allowing enough time for it to melt the parent metal and penetrate.

I had similar problems for long enough but it'll come right eventually. You just need to keep at it.

Regards
Peter

 

[123]

Thanks for the replys.
I tried turning the wire speed up which helped a bit but i still cant seem to get the right sound. When i turn the power up, it just buzzes louder. Is it just practice that is needed?

ETA - im using argosheild light gas

 

[malcolm]

Post some photos of your welds if you can - that'll improve chances of diagnosis. How far do you hold the torch from the work? I've a suspicion you might be a bit far away with yours. Ought to be so close that you regularly hit the shroud against the work, but not so close that you rest the shroud on the work.

 

[123]

 

[malcolm]

There's a fair build up of weld in places there. Middle one looks like a cold start, so if gravity was involved you might end up having trouble. I'd guess increasing the power (and also possibly wire speed) and moving the torch faster might do the trick Otherwise try a weaving motion.

Which direction were you welding? Vertical down is a lot easier than vertical up.

 

[Sparkey]

My guess would be Malc, the weld on the left is vertical up and the other 2 are vertical down...but i could be wrong offcourse!