Welding General Thread - A general guide on turning hot steel into trucks, trains, and airplanes as well as posting your own welds.

[Smar Mijou]

They flash on instantly man. Just clean the front and replace the clear plate when needed, and you'll have no issues. Batteries last for fucking ever, and they have indicator lights when low I always keep a spare pair at home just for that purpose, and plates in my car, which it's gonna need today. So to answer: it just works. Don't be a slob, maintain it, which isn't hard, they can take a beating, and it'll serve you well.

I have a cheap auto darkening helmet, (Harbor Freight special) and even those properly set up are worlds better than a standard flip-up helmet with a lens, IMO.

I'm no certified welder at all, but I do have a Lincoln buzzbox, a cheap HF MIG, and a cheap Amazon TIG that I need to add foot pedal control to if I ever decide to get somewhat serious with it. I'd love to be more self-sufficient with metal fabrication and repair , especially with more "exotic" stuff like stainless and aluminum. I can bubblegum together some mild steel, bit anything substantial or structural, I would trust to more experienced people.

 

[WelperHelper99]

@WelperHelper99 I have to ask, is the welding really that OP? I remember years ago when I was talking to my English teacher, she told me about how her grandfather, after going into retirement, decided to learn welding as a hobby, it turns out that there was a crisis of welders in the country (there were like just a couple of them, 2 or 3) which turned his hobby into an extremely profitable business. He earned more money than ever in his career and at one point he jokingly said "What was I even doing most of my life?". So now I'm wondering is the welding really this good?

You can make a lot of money now a days. It's a lot of hard work, but there's millions of openings.

 

[Iron Hamster]

Oh you found the old GE videos! We actually still use these in educational materials funnily enough, especially with stick, since the fundamentals haven't changed.

I caught this one the other day. Pretty cool to help people understand exactly what's going on.

If you haven't seen him before, one of my favorite welding channels is I C Weld I prefer his way of walking through equipment repairs vs instructional type videos with clean steel and square angles

I like watching this guy: Cutting Edge Engineering

 

[WelperHelper99]

I caught this one the other day. Pretty cool to help people understand exactly what's going on.

I like watching this guy: Cutting Edge Engineering

Yeah, that's basically it. Pretty good camera for being able to take that much light.

 

[KittyGremlin]

Bought a starter MIG, learning to weld some 0.7 mm sheet metal (tall order for a newb I know). Any tips for butt welding thin steel on a car body? So far the results haven't been great, I had a couple of burn-throughs but I'm switching to thinner wire and will review my voltages and feeds.

 

[Barry McKockner]

Bought a starter MIG, learning to weld some 0.7 mm sheet metal (tall order for a newb I know). Any tips for butt welding thin steel on a car body? So far the results haven't been great, I had a couple of burn-throughs but I'm switching to thinner wire and will review my voltages and feeds.

The biggest tip for sheet metal, especially on a car, is move around and give it time to cool. too much heat for too long will warp the base metal. shows I used to watch on powerblockwould do a bunch of singular tacks, moving to a different area after each one. I've heatsoaked and warped 3/16" steel before by Welding too long at one time.

 

[WelperHelper99]

Bought a starter MIG, learning to weld some 0.7 mm sheet metal (tall order for a newb I know). Any tips for butt welding thin steel on a car body? So far the results haven't been great, I had a couple of burn-throughs but I'm switching to thinner wire and will review my voltages and feeds.

Mig can do sheet, but you need to move fast. Grind the paint first, then let it rip. I'd recommend either a small weave or a up and down motion for consistency.

 

[Rakovnik]

Bought a starter MIG, learning to weld some 0.7 mm sheet metal (tall order for a newb I know). Any tips for butt welding thin steel on a car body? So far the results haven't been great, I had a couple of burn-throughs but I'm switching to thinner wire and will review my voltages and feeds.

Miller has a good article on welding body panels with MIG & TIG if you haven't read through it already

 

[Magnus Opum]

Bought a starter MIG, learning to weld some 0.7 mm sheet metal (tall order for a newb I know). Any tips for butt welding thin steel on a car body? So far the results haven't been great, I had a couple of burn-throughs but I'm switching to thinner wire and will review my voltages and feeds.

Are you using gas or fluxcore ?

 

[KittyGremlin]

Are you using gas or fluxcore ?

Mixed gas.

 

[Magnus Opum]

Mixed gas.

Try doing this :

It's called back-step welding, if you want to look more info about it

 

[KittyGremlin]

Try doing this :
View attachment 5429889

It's called back-step welding, if you want to look more info about it

That's a cool idea, though with metal this thin you're gonna be tacking it until there's barely any longer segments left to do a continuous weld.

I got some brass to serve as a heatsink/backing, will try as soon as I have free time to get back into the project.

 

[Magnus Opum]

That's a cool idea, though with metal this thin you're gonna be tacking it until there's barely any longer segments left to do a continuous weld.

I got some brass to serve as a heatsink/backing, will try as soon as I have free time to get back into the project.

Tacks can be an art of their own. You can also do back-steps with tacks, it helps with metal distortion and stress.

 

[Catgirl Enthusiast]

Bought a starter MIG, learning to weld some 0.7 mm sheet metal (tall order for a newb I know). Any tips for butt welding thin steel on a car body? So far the results haven't been great, I had a couple of burn-throughs but I'm switching to thinner wire and will review my voltages and feeds.

I use .035 wire. (Merican units) I'm assuming you mean 75/25 by mixed gas. Good. Tack your shit together with lower amps. This is going to be hard to describe. You tack it together pushing as much wire as you can as low of heat as you can just to keep from burning through. Personally I'd start bigger and then work towards the tacks being about three inches from each other. Once you have it tacked you need to up the amps and work off of the tacks. Lots of amps. We're running a bead on 1/4 inch steel amps. Aim for the lower third of a tack and give it a quick burn. Zap. Say Zap to yourself. Zap to the extreme is far too long. Chris isn't a welder. Zap is how long it should take. Maybe not even that long. If you aim at the previous tack you will be focusing the heat at a thicker area and the higher amps will make everything incorporate together nicely. You are tack welding this thing togheter with hundreds or thousands of hot tacks. As others have said move around. You don't want heat building up in any area. According to the size of the panel you are welding you might even need to sit there and wait for shit to cool down. You can use compressed air to help with cooling. Probably don't use water. With nice clean modern sheet metal and proper discipline you can lay down some nice flat tacks. You can quickly hit them with a flap disc and be ready for the body man. With the ancient shit I normaly work on you also need to worry about the amount of heat you introduce by grinding. It's the same shit. Move around and don't put too much heat in any one area. It is slow and super not fun but I recommend using a die grinder with a cutoff wheel as a grinder. Really when welding body panels there is a time to bondo trade off. The more time you are willing to spend the less bondo you will need to fill the imperfections and vice versa.

 

[Troon_Patrol]

I love welding, I do a lot of custom metal Fab, %90 is for my own projects like gunsmithing and such. I want to get into brazing AL, I have not needed to do it but, I have projects coming up like VERY complicated AL jigs and such that need to be brazed together, or I guess mig'd. I ordered some .35 AL wire for my mig, I'll probably play around with it for a while see how it goes.

See if you can spot the weld in this pic

 

[KittyGremlin]

The biggest tip for sheet metal, especially on a car, is move around and give it time to cool. too much heat for too long will warp the base metal. shows I used to watch on powerblockwould do a bunch of singular tacks, moving to a different area after each one. I've heatsoaked and warped 3/16" steel before by Welding too long at one time.

Mig can do sheet, but you need to move fast. Grind the paint first, then let it rip. I'd recommend either a small weave or a up and down motion for consistency.

Miller has a good article on welding body panels with MIG & TIG if you haven't read through it already

Tacks can be an art of their own. You can also do back-steps with tacks, it helps with metal distortion and stress.

I use .035 wire. (Merican units) I'm assuming you mean 75/25 by mixed gas. Good. Tack your shit together with lower amps. This is going to be hard to describe. You tack it together pushing as much wire as you can as low of heat as you can just to keep from burning through. Personally I'd start bigger and then work towards the tacks being about three inches from each other. Once you have it tacked you need to up the amps and work off of the tacks. Lots of amps. We're running a bead on 1/4 inch steel amps. Aim for the lower third of a tack and give it a quick burn. Zap. Say Zap to yourself. Zap to the extreme is far too long. Chris isn't a welder. Zap is how long it should take. Maybe not even that long. If you aim at the previous tack you will be focusing the heat at a thicker area and the higher amps will make everything incorporate together nicely. You are tack welding this thing togheter with hundreds or thousands of hot tacks. As others have said move around. You don't want heat building up in any area. According to the size of the panel you are welding you might even need to sit there and wait for shit to cool down. You can use compressed air to help with cooling. Probably don't use water. With nice clean modern sheet metal and proper discipline you can lay down some nice flat tacks. You can quickly hit them with a flap disc and be ready for the body man. With the ancient shit I normaly work on you also need to worry about the amount of heat you introduce by grinding. It's the same shit. Move around and don't put too much heat in any one area. It is slow and super not fun but I recommend using a die grinder with a cutoff wheel as a grinder. Really when welding body panels there is a time to bondo trade off. The more time you are willing to spend the less bondo you will need to fill the imperfections and vice versa.

Will try this advice when I can, currently working on removing the engine to get better access to the stuff I need to weld. Also waiting for some repair panels to arrive.

 

[Rakovnik]

I love welding, I do a lot of custom metal Fab, %90 is for my own projects like gunsmithing and such. I want to get into brazing AL, I have not needed to do it but, I have projects coming up like VERY complicated AL jigs and such that need to be brazed together, or I guess mig'd. I ordered some .35 AL wire for my mig, I'll probably play around with it for a while see how it goes.

See if you can spot the weld in this pic

View attachment 5449740

Honestly I can't tell, nice work that's too smooth, I'll throw my guesses out there anyways

currently working on removing the engine to get better access to the stuff I need to weld

Isn't that the best part, hours of disassembly and prep for a couple minutes of welding! I don't think you mentioned it in your last post, what car are you building?

 

[KittyGremlin]

Honestly I can't tell, nice work that's too smooth, I'll throw my guesses out there anyways

View attachment 5452986


Isn't that the best part, hours of disassembly and prep for a couple minutes of welding! I don't think you mentioned it in your last post, what car are you building?

Oh, I'll need to remove the engine for a proper tune-up and rust removal anyway, might as well do it now.

It's a '72 1302 bug. Nothing rare or special, but the parts are cheap so I think it's a great first project.

 

[Rakovnik]

Oh, I'll need to remove the engine for a proper tune-up and rust removal anyway, might as well do it now.

It's a '72 1302 bug. Nothing rare or special, but the parts are cheap so I think it's a great first project.

Ohh it's a Beetle, I haven't worked on one but I assume the air cooled engine and minimal electronics make it a breeze. Not rare but cool nonetheless!

 

[Mr. Confederate Man]

minimal electronics

What electronics?