Mig photos

[clem dog]

I used the mig for the first time today!

Welding M12 bolts to 6mm plate to be bedded in concrete to hold a ram box.

Welding around a round thing aint easy

The bolts seem to melt away so easy, they were marked as 4.8's onthe top when they should probably have been 8.8

Any advice?

 

[chap]

Look ok to me. For less meltage, you could arc up on the plate and flick up onto the bolt head.

 

[clem dog]

Tried to do that but, the damned shroud is too big to see around!

I should have favoured the plate like you said, that would have saved the bolt head from melting too much.
Lots of smoke from the galv on the bolts though

Clem

 

[Welderpaul]

Your settings look ok. Its not easy welding galv anyway. You just need a bit more practice to keep the stop/starts tidy. Knowing where to point the end of the wire when starting against the end of a finished weld helps - save getting a build-up of weld metal.
They will hold, and not seen, so its a winner!

 

[clem dog]

Thanks Paul. Could do with an extra elbow though then i would not have to stop

Would it be best to start forwards from the stop then work back for a bit then forwards again? Or would that still cause a build up of weld?

Clem

 

[Welderpaul]

As long as its nothing mega critical i start with the wire just a fraction away from the stop and let it pool for a moment before moving on. The second it meets the top of the previous weld, start to move. Helps to have a decent screen that you can see through, often as well if the end of the wire is still glowing from the previous weld it lights the job up a little bit so you get an accurate start position

 

[pidgeon chit welder]

CD,
If you had drilled the plates and inserted the bolt through you would have found it easier to just weld the bolt heads.

I did a similar jobby when I errected my old farm portal buildings . I shoved a bit of bored out polystyerene tube over each bolt as well so that the threads stayed clean , the bolts tops were 40 mm below the finished floor , I poured a bit of petrol on the polystyerene to melt it once the anchors had fully set ( 28 days ) then set the portals up off the by now smooth power floated floors, and filled the holes after coating each nut & visable bolt with some car spray underseal .

 

[clem dog]

Hi PCW

I used the proper bolt with square washers to make bolt boxes for my last cattle house. These were just a thing made in the spur of the moment for a job and the bolts were not that long so thought they would be better welded on the ends!
Plus it got me an excuse!

Clem

 

[clem dog]

Thanks for the replys men. Just need to keep practising! Ill keep you posted!

Clem

 

[Sparkey]

Nice job clem! that's the neatest farm welding i'd ever seen!
The welds look good, good settings, grrrrreat!
Please post a pic when it's finished (with cattle and all if you'd like!)

 

[clem dog]

Thanks Sparks, it just going to take a lot of practice!


I will be working a little at it today again and will take a few pics then maybe start a thread in the projects section!

Clem

 

[Sparkey]

Thanks Sparks, it just going to take a lot of practice!


I will be working a little at it today again and will take a few pics then maybe start a thread in the projects section!

Clem

Why? be a bit more confident! they look great! But practiscing is always good!
I've seen worse! the other day even...they had a new guy come in at work...it's a complete disaster! imagine this: a welder with a drinking problem... he welded a jig shut already, we had to take the part out with an angle grinder.....

 

[clem dog]

I just find it a lot more difficult to set up than a stick. With the stick, set your amps, off you go, so to speak.

MIG, on the other hand, voltage settings then wirespeed, can be a little harder to master. You then also have the same variables to watch for as the stick, albiet they affect the weld in different ways but still they are variables.

Maybe I just have caught the hang of arc welding and it comes to me easier now!

Thats why I neeed practise

Clem

 

[clem dog]

Here is a few more pics of some of my welding.

These contain a bit of experimentation with stickout, speed of travel (thought that just seemed to happen on its own)and weaving movement.

Still find that I have to keep correcting myself from feeding the torch into the work as with the stick. This is evident in the last picture as I had to keep stopping when the wire burned back and stuck to the tip. I could feel the wire sticking and jerking then it just stuck. Knackered a few tips at that. My tip is 6 or 7 mm inside the shroud and I still have to keep it about another 15 or so mm off the work. Does this seem normal as it seems to save the tip.

I tightened the feed rolls a little and that seemed to help a bit.

I also found that grinding off the galv on the sides of the plate was not enough. As the pool melted into the joint, the galv would burst the pool out in a small explosion and land everywhere,killing my fleece and the back of my head!

This was all done at setting 10 of 14 on a 300 amp set. I fiddled with the wire speed till it seemed nice, though this seemd to change a bit as per the problem stated above made me beleive my wire speed was not fast enough.

Would this setting give me enough voltage for spray transfer? When the pool was established everything went real quiet with no spatter at all, or did I just find a a nice sweet spot? It was shortly after this happened that the wire would begin to stick and then it would all go pear shaped. But it didnt get half hot at this point.

Turning the wire speed up at this point gave a very harsh sounding arc with lots of spatter, although it did not stick to the work and just wire brushed off easily.

Any feed back or critisim graciously recieved

Clem

 

[Bsmith]

Here is a few more pics of some of my welding.

These contain a bit of experimentation with stickout, speed of travel (thought that just seemed to happen on its own)and weaving movement.

Still find that I have to keep correcting myself from feeding the torch into the work as with the stick. This is evident in the last picture as I had to keep stopping when the wire burned back and stuck to the tip. I could feel the wire sticking and jerking then it just stuck. Knackered a few tips at that. My tip is 6 or 7 mm inside the shroud and I still have to keep it about another 15 or so mm off the work. Does this seem normal as it seems to save the ti
I tightened the feed rolls a little and that seemed to help a bit.

I also found that grinding off the galv on the sides of the plate was not enough. As the pool melted into the joint, the galv would burst the pool out in a small explosion and land everywhere,killing my fleece and the back of my head!

This was all done at setting 10 of 14 on a 300 amp set. I fiddled with the wire speed till it seemed nice, though this seemd to change a bit as per the problem stated above made me beleive my wire speed was not fast enough.

Would this setting give me enough voltage for spray transfer? When the pool was established everything went real quiet with no spatter at all, or did I just find a a nice sweet spot? It was shortly after this happened that the wire would begin to stick and then it would all go pear shaped. But it didnt get half hot at this point.

Turning the wire speed up at this point gave a very harsh sounding arc with lots of spatter, although it did not stick to the work and just wire brushed off easily.

Any feed back or critisim graciously recieved

ClemView attachment 12720

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The wire burn back and stuck to the tip means too slow wire feed speed. Turn WFS up slightly, the arc should sound a bit like cloth tearing or bacon frying. Your photos of the bolts show a good voltage and WFS setting. The tips may not be knackered, if you unscrew them then cut the wire to get them off the torch, grip them lightly in vise and file the flat tip end until the wire pushes out. A set of oxy/acet nozzle cleaners are a great help here too. Shroud 15mm from work should be ok as it looks like its fairly heavy guage metal your welding, more like 8 - 12 mm on thinner. I would grind the edges of galvanised plate and back about an inch on the flats of each side. Photos 3, 6 and 7 show lack of penetration, up the voltage setting here. Also metal in photo 7 would be better if ground clean before welding.

 

[clem dog]

Sorry, for some reason I did not see this reply. I must have misse it on the email account.

I have done various bits and pieces with the mig since this and I feel im getting on better now! Ill post some pics when I do my next work.

Thanks to all who took time to reply!

Clem