215 - Couple of questions.

[Damaged]

Finaly got my 215 today (Cheers Steve) and what a piece of kit it is!

I've been using a gasless Clarke 105 EN for a few years and I just can't believe the difference, in all honesty I was happy with the welding I was doing with the little Clarke but after using the 215 for a few hours I realise those welds were sh!te!

Anyway I have a couple of questions if you don't mind:

1) When using the 215 some of the time all I can hear is a deep hum from the transformer but at other times I'm getting a loud crackling noise, in both instances the welds look fine (to me anyway ) but when I have the crackling noise the work area is full of beads of molten metal, it's as though the tip of the wire is exploding when it hits the weld pool. I'm practising on scrap sections of 1" box with the same settings so I guess it's something I'm doing inconsistantly. Any pointers / ideas?

2) The box section I'm practising on has a wall thickness of approx 4mm, when welding this thickness how wide would you expect the weld to be? I'm just trying to gauge the speed I should be moving the torch as In one pass with the 215 I'm getting a weld width that would take 3 passes with my old Clarke.

Many thanks,

Mick.

2)

 

[malcolm]

Post pickies! Of the welds that is - I've seen the Portamig.

Spatter would generally be a result of the surface not being clean, other contamination, or excessive wire speed. Given your welds are much wider than before I'm guessing wirespeed.

The Clarke would have worked only in a very narrow wire speed range, where the Portamig will compensate and run within a much wider range. For fine tuning try doing something similar to the video in http://www.mig-welding.co.uk/wire-speed.htm

 

[shenion]

1) sounds like the wire speed is too fast, that will cause spatter and popping.

2) that depends on the type of weld. Usually total width is about 2x the base metal thickness.

Going from gasless to a proper MIG is a huge step up

 

[Damaged]

Cheers Gents

Will have a further play tomorrow.

Sounds like wire speed is the issue as I'm getting welds approx 1/2" wide

Strange though as I'm sure I've read on this forum that people generaly leave the wire speed at around 5 then fine tune for positional stuff?

 

[malcolm]

The 5 is meaningless - the actual wire speed at that setting varies from welder to welder even by the same manufacturer.

If you want an initial set up try the calculator. That was put together with a 181 so ought to work well for the 215.

 

[Damaged]

Ah,

Thanks Malcolm.

Will try and post some piccies tomorrow but following my failed "Southport Airshow" attempt I'm not sure they will post.