Found the perfect welder!

[ineed2fly]

Yes, they are at mine atleast. You can go with an auto-darkening helmet, I learned on one, and it will certainly help, but they are $50 vs like $25, I don't find it to be much harder to just nod the helmet down. Just put the gun where it needs to be, and then nod, and as soon as you start, you can see. Only benefit the auto-darkening have is that you dont need to flip it up to start a new weld. Get a brush, it will probably come with one, but it will last like a day, and then gloves of course, but don't worry about buying anything too nice looking, get cheap and ugly, they wind up looking that way in about a week anyways. The wire would be a good thing to grab if you're down there anyways. It's gonna be a costly day, and maybe a set of tips isn't a bad idea, I ruined the one with the welder on the first bead....

 

[oscaryu1]

Do they include instructions? What's the clamp for? How do you start the welding? (Like you jab or so for arc welding)

 

[jr dragster T]

You just put the wire to the metle and pull the trigger and you have INSTANT BZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

 

[oscaryu1]

What's the clamp for?

 

[ineed2fly]

You attach it to the metal so you can complete the circuit. Just clamp it fairly close to the weld, and then pick up the gun, touch it to where you want to weld (You will have a 1/4 inch piece of wire coming out of the tip that you will touch to the metal) then press the trigger and it starts to weld, then just travel in a zig-zag pattern just like a stick welder. It's that easy, if you can draw a squiggly line, you can weld with a wirefeed welder!

 

[oscaryu1]

Yay haha! How much should I hold the tip above the metal?

Are there any first time common errors I should watch out? Breaker tripping? Mask falling off? Something catch on fire?

Thanks guys!

 

[ineed2fly]

Let the actual tip (end of the gun) rest on the metal, and then the wire should be touching the metal as well. This will all make more sense when you get it, but trust me, wirefeed is like a bajillion times better than stick, atleast for your purposes. I have a welder that will draw 20 amps and won't trip my 15 amp breaker as long as it's the only thing on that outlet. Make sure you get a helmet while you are there, the hand held mask supplied is crap, and it is very hard to learn to weld holding it with one hand. And fire is an issue, just weld in an open space atleast 10 feet away from anything flamable in all directions, so a 20 foot diameter circle.

 

[jr dragster T]

Ok hold the gas nozzle or flux core nozzle about 3/8 to 1/2 away from the base metel. I found with the flux core welding it makes thicker sparks but they dont fly far. But with the MIG welder it throws colder sparks farther. I've never had a probelem with welding.

 

[Kenny_McCormic]

Angle the gun so its sorta pointing in the direction you are welding(helps with the flux gas), keep the bead around 3/8" wide. When set correctly the other side of the part your welding should be yellow hot where its being welded. Cover anything that melts (tires, seats, etc) in wet rags so they dont have holes from hot slag.

 

[newrider3]

Be careful welding in a pair of jeans with a hole in them. The fringe around the hole catches on fire easily, I found this out the hard way yesterday. Also get a can of Pam, and spray down the general area you'll be welding. The flux core wirefeed makes a lot of spatter, and the Pam keeps most of it from sticking.

 

[oscaryu1]

Hmm... so MIG is that easy? Just press the triger? Automatic wirefeed and all?

 

[Kenny_McCormic]

Flucxcore/mig really is that easy, most of the actual learning is getting good at setting the amperage and feed rate correctly for what your working on.

 

[ineed2fly]

Yeah, like I said if you can draw a zig-zag line, you can wirefeed weld. And yes, be carefull with the jeans, this has happened to me about...I think 6 times now? You're sitting there welding, and your leg feels warm, and you think your leg is close to a hot weld, so you move it away, and it keeps heating up, this is when you flip up your mask, look over, and start beating your leg like an insane monkey.

When you said spray the pam, did you mean on the metal? Cuz that seems really nice, my welder throws TONS of slag I need to grind off later, wouldn't the pam just burn off?

 

[newrider3]

Yeah, you spray the Pam on the metal. It doesn't really burn off, since it's designed for cooking. It does make a good amount of smoke that smells like you're cooking something, kind of covers up the burning flux smell.

 

[ineed2fly]

I'll give that a shot, I need to weld today, of course my mom is going to kill me for using all her pam.....:toetap05:

 

[oscaryu1]

What is a good starting out amperage and feed rate?

 

[Kenny_McCormic]

Depends on the metal, metal thickness, wire, etc you want it to not burn though but get the metal yellow hot or hotter all the way through, look at a few pro welds on various stuff around the house/garage to see what a properly done one looks like.

 

[ineed2fly]

Also if the wire is pushing the gun back away from the metal, it's too high, there should be no resistance on the gun. And thinner metal is lower amperage, thicker is higher amperage.

 

[oscaryu1]

Could you give me a amp vs thickness ratio to start with?

 

[ineed2fly]

It really depends on wire speed as well, and quality of the metal, conduit will burn through on 15 amps, and with the same thickness of square tubing it wont penetrate properly. The welder should come with a diagram showing a weld, and why it's all jacked up, and how to fix it, if not I can post a picture of that page in mine.