Kwik
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 07:40 PM |
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my first weld
(as a pre note: this is coppied from another forum where i purposely took pics with unrelated gadgets and stuff in it to take the mick out of another
member, so ignore them )
Thursday, for me was spent shopping, i had earnt a fair bit of money over the last 4 months working and with no outgoings i had near enough £1000. so
i done what any 18 year old teenager would. i bought a dirty big welder with clamps and mask, and a dirty big angle grinder with spare grinding disks
and cutting disk, result!
so, heres a few pics of my new toys 
so i bought a lot of stuff and spent a lot of money. so what you ask am i going to do with all of this? well im keeping it a secret in case its a
massive flop, so your gunna have to wait.
i then decided to set up my welder that evening and ran into a few problems with feeding it, so i asked in that and cerb and fraggs helped me fix it
:good:
today, i thought i should have a little play around with it. so i drove down to a B&Q warehouse and picked up the only bits of steel they had, 2
metres of 1cmx1cm box section with a 1mm wall thickness. seriously?
thats all they had, which threw my idea out the window of building a nice stand for when i order in proper amounts of metal to keep it off the damp
ground. damn.
so on the drive back i was thinking of something to make, something that i could try out all my equipment, not too hard, not too simple. a square
!!
no, i decided however to make 2 frams where i can fix some plastic sheet or heat proof fabric of some sort to act as a spark shield for when i weld
other stuff. so i cut out my metal into 20cm (inside length) sections so make a square where i can then fix some form of material in the middle. here
are the pics of what i done.
this is my first ever set of welds with this machine, and second ever time welding, i played around with the settings after blowing threw about 5
million times and eventually do to a stage where i was making strong-ish welds.
i grinded down the edges of them to see how they actually welded and how it was doing and it looks pretty good to me, it may not look pretty but try
as hard as i could i could not brake it apart, tomorrow im gunna try standing on the finished square to see if it can take my weight.
so thats my last 2 days, i would have liked to have done more but i took so long setting up and figuring out how to cut it i didn't actually
have a lot of time... and now my back hurts.
also bare in mind that it was welded outside in my garden without a proper workbench and using gasless welding wire which splatters a lot and is
naturally un-neat. so current MIG welders, what do you think?
chris
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907
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:04 PM |
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I can honestly say, without fear of contradiction, I've never seen anything like it.
Cheers,
Paul G
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Mr Whippy
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:08 PM |
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for pratice it is better to learn to weld two plates of over lapping steel togeather first, about 2mm thick till you get an idea of how to handle the
welder. Once you have got that good, do a butt joint weld with the plate till you are not making holes and the welds are good. Then you should be ok
at doing the tube.
I use gasless wire too and yes it isn't as clean a weld as gas but if it is splattering alot then turn the wirespeed down a bit till it is just
loudly fizzing. Do make sure you chamfer the ends of the tube properly so the weld starts at the deepest part of the joint and fills out rather than
the weld just sitting on the surface.
more pratice needed but keep going 
that weld in the corner has too high a wirespeed and not enough heat which is why it is not smooth, the weld has built up on it's self
Welding does take some time to master
[Edited on 25/2/11 by Mr Whippy]
Fame is when your old car is plastered all over the internet
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hicost blade
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:09 PM |
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I would say, get some mig mix gas, some 0.6mm wire, some scrap and some practice.....
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Mr Whippy
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:16 PM |
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aim for this kind of result which you can do with you welding set, with practice
Fame is when your old car is plastered all over the internet
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Kwik
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:37 PM |
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ok its not the cleanest weld but it was my first, in a windy garden with a welder i have never used before...
its only 1mm thick metal and a very small area to actually weld, im not blowing through anymore, and it looks worse than it is because i accidentally
pressed the trigger whilst bringing it back across, making those balls on top of the weld.
it is very strong though, i cant seem to brake them apart no matter how hard i try, and all i really care about is the strength of the weld, not how
pretty it looks...
anyway thanks for the feedback, will weld the rest tomorrow if the weathers nice, and i have a friend going to pick up some scrap metal from his work
for some more practice, this is all i have at the moment and really wanted to star today, i know its not the best thing to start with...
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ssc28
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:40 PM |
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the "in the garden and windy" seems to be your problem. The argon shrouding the weld is getting blown away which is why you haven't
got a weld like Whippy's.
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Stuart_B
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:44 PM |
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hi there, as said, all i done was got scarp steel, cleaned it downed and welded and welded, until it got better. still not the best but, good
enough.
"Thursday, for me was spent shopping, i had earnt a fair bit of money over the last 4 months working and with no outgoings i had near enough
£1000. so i done what any 18 year old teenager would. i bought a dirty big welder with clamps and mask, and a dirty big angle grinder with spare
grinding disks and cutting disk, result! "
that sounds like something i would do.lol
cheers
stu
black mk indy, 1.6pinto on cbr600 bike carb's.
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bonzoronnie
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:48 PM |
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Fair do's
You have bought some nice kit 
As a former welding tutor, I wouldn't dream of taking the mick out of your first efforts ( seen worse first time attemps ) 
My best advice, grab youself some thickish sheet metal scraps & spend a good while learning to run a contant weld bead along it.
You don't even need to try to join pieces together for starters, it'll only lead to dissapointment 
Once you get the hang of your welders settings & are able to rum a nice tidy bead on a pice of sheet metal your in business & are ready to
start joining stuff together
At least you are willing to give it a fair crack & I wish you well with you endeavours.
That's more than can be said about either of my 2 lads .... More kit here than you could ever need & not the slightest interest.
[Edited on 25/2/11 by bonzoronnie]
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Kwik
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:54 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by bonzoronnie
You have bought some nice kit
That's more than can be said about either of my 2 lads .... More kit here than you could ever need & not the slightest interest.
[Edited on 25/2/11 by bonzoronnie]
thats the complete opposite to my house, parents are confused about the prospect of me liking cars and hoping to build one, all they keep asking is
how im going to make the panels....
an the problem wouldn't be not having enough gas, as its gasless....
as i said i have some scrap on its way hopefully, but just wanted to do a bit today as i don't have much school holiday left...
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ashg
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 08:59 PM |
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i can safely say that's not a good enough standard to build a car yet! but don't be disheartened because it wont take you long to learn.
As ronnie says forget trying to join things together and just try and do some nice straight runs on flat pieces of metal. if you haven't
already signed up to the forum on www.mig-welding.co.uk I would strongly suggest it. they have some excellent getting started guides and loads of
professional welders to help you out.
good attempt keep it up! learning with gasless wire will always be difficult as the process is much more violent. if you can get some gas and normal
wire, as it will make learning 10 times easier. as you say appearance is not everything but without meaning to be horrible or harsh your not quite
there yet.
do loads of straight flat lines with different settings then post a picture up
Anything With Tits or Wheels Will cost you MONEY!!
Haynes Roadster (Finished)
Exocet (Finished & Sold)
New Project (Started)
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Davey D
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 09:10 PM |
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by the look of that weld, i would say that it is a gas-less welder that you are using? using a shield gas will make the weld process easier, and
neater. i dont think ive ever seen a nice weld from a gas-less unit
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Mr Whippy
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| posted on 25/2/11 at 09:35 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Davey D
by the look of that weld, i would say that it is a gas-less welder that you are using? using a shield gas will make the weld process easier, and
neater. i dont think ive ever seen a nice weld from a gas-less unit
it can be done so long as the welds quite constant, then the slag forms on top just peeling off like a stick weld, I've been using gasless for
about 15 years now and get good clean results. I did try gas on my third welder but its rubbish for outside and costs a fortune so just went back to
gasless
Fame is when your old car is plastered all over the internet
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