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TIG Welding - the easy way.


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7 minutes ago, mtrehy said:

Current is a bit low for 2mm, I'd be nearer 90 base and you can always back off the pedal a bit. If you're material is cold you will be struggling to get a tack on without cooking the aluminium. You want to get the weld down pretty quick - don't want to hang around and cook the aluminium.

Basic things help a lot - good mask (can you see the weld pool very clearly? you need to), decent gloves that allow feel (not mig gauntlets), keep the filler rod shielded, clean everything, regrind the tungsten every time you touch it (very annoying for a beginner), keep practicing... you should be using pretty thin filler wire for 2mm, (1.6).

 

 

I'm doing all things you outline except pre heating the job.

The settings list specifies 2.4mm filler rod but I only have 1.6mm at the mo'.

 

Roger

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1 minute ago, RogerH said:

I'm doing all things you outline except pre heating the job.

The settings list specifies 2.4mm filler rod but I only have 1.6mm at the mo'.

 

Roger

I wouldn't preheat it either, I meant when the material is cold at first I'd use higher amps to tack it.

Sounds like you're doing everything correct. Just practice now. Took me a lot of practice and I don't weld ali that regularly so would still practice a bit first even now if I had an important job to do.

Only other thing is to make sure you stay nice and close. 

Don't get hung up on filler size, electrode size etc. Even base current isn't that important as you can just set it high and use the pedal anyway. Really is just practice now I reckon.

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From that I'd say that you are too low on amps and doing everything too slowly. Looks like you're taking too long to get the pool going which is cooking the aluminium. Try increasing amps, if you're 60 now, try 100, you can always back the pedal off. 

You cleaning with acetone or alcohol before welding?

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Not retated: When I was in the army for my duty, I was trained MIG welding thick (like 25 mm) aluminum for battle damage repair of aluminium (light weight, 20-20 tonne) tanks. It was so simple, once our instructor set the parameters. The torch looked like a machine gun, almost same size. Yes, MIG, not TIG. For my today’s Lincoln MIG welder I bought a training manual that was very helpful to get a good understanding of the effect of changing each parameter ( there are many even with MIG). That helped a lot.

Knowing you (a bit) Roger, I’m convinced you will get it sorted.

Cheers,
Waldi

 

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Hi Waldi,

indeed, MIG can do some mighty thick sections.

The TIG is coming along. I've only been playing with it for a few days and many of the samples would work OK. Sadly I am not consistent at the moment.

Bit practice practice practice and it will come.

 

Roger

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16 minutes ago, RogerH said:

Hi Waldi,

indeed, MIG can do some mighty thick sections.

The TIG is coming along. I've only been playing with it for a few days and many of the samples would work OK. Sadly I am not consistent at the moment.

Bit practice practice practice and it will come.

 

Roger

......are you sneaking back into Heathrow and nicking aluminium from all the parked up planes ???

Ill ask my son to look for “holes “ !!!!

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2 minutes ago, Crawfie said:

......are you sneaking back into Heathrow and nicking aluminium from all the parked up planes ???

Ill ask my son to look for “holes “ !!!!

No Need - I borrowed some for safe keeping before I retired.

I'm getting through quite a bit at the moment with all this practice.

 

Roger

 

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I self taught TIG after many years of mig and I reckon I was about 15-20 hours of solid practice (over the period of a month or so) before I could consistently weld thinish aluminium well enough that I'd be happy for it to be seen on a finished project. I started without a foot pedal and just using the button on the torch which I realised was so much harder than using the pedal. As soon as I used a pedal I would never go back to the button!

You might find it easier practicing on something thicker, maybe 1/8" sheet. Will be more forgiving at the beginning. 

 

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Hi Folks,

had a while this morning doing practice runs on butt joints and solid metal and it was going  pretty good more than it wasn't.

Foolishly I decided to give it a go for real.  The first 3" straight was very good (for me) and then ...................................

The best thing I did was to stop before I melted the whole thing.  Not sure quite what was going wrong.

Removed the filler plate and cleaned up the edges of the hole.

I then TRied a few more practice runs and it worked OK    Hmmm.

Scratch head time and a cuppa

 

Roger

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Indeed. I use the SS wire brush.  I'm running out of things to blame.

It is just practice.

I am alarmed at how much gas is used.  I'm running at 8L/Min and the bottle is less than 1/2 full after what appears to be a short time.

 

Roger 

 

 

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1 hour ago, RogerH said:

Indeed. I use the SS wire brush.  I'm running out of things to blame.

It is just practice.

I am alarmed at how much gas is used.  I'm running at 8L/Min and the bottle is less than 1/2 full after what appears to be a short time.

 

Roger 

 

 

You will get through lots of gas when you're learning. Most of it is being lost with post-flow as you will be stop-start all the time and it's post-flowing everytime you stop. Obviously you won't be constantly stop/starting when you are actually reasonable at TIG welding but you do when learning.

I would reduce the post-flow duration to save a bit of gas. Whatever your problems are it isn't post-flow.

I'd say you are correct with your diagnosis, just practice. 

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I found it helpfull to put a steel plate under the seam not to let it pop down and just from the beginning put the focus on connection of both sides of the seam by heating especially in that area.

I used the green tungsten sticks that easily brake when sharpening again after used. Any ideas why not to use the golden?

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Hi Roger

The R tech tig welders are great pieces of kit i have had one for some time now and have done all the  body work repairs on my 3 with it.

Obviously you are using AC  and   pure tungsten or zirconated electrodes sticking out about 5mm from the ceramic shield

What gas are you using     

Are you balling the end of the electrode before welding ?

Feeding the filler rod took me ages to get the hang of even now i have good and bad days.  I found that the WP16 torch that came with the welder  somewhat heavy when doing  welding on the shell and changed it for a smaller lighter WP9 (R Tech or ebay) also changed the ceramic pots for  glass Pyrex ones,  eBay again(you can see through them when welding). Have you got an auto dimming welding mask? 

It's practice .. practice  perhaps doing some welding on 1mm steel sheet would give you some practice 

Regards Adrian Salisbury

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