Wannabe Welder

[Bill George]

Welding rods, 7018 is a low hydrogen high strength rod and easy to get a good weld with, but Only if dry and kept in a heated oven. Without being dry it picks up moisture and is no longer considered low hydrogen and can develop cracks like a normal weld. 6010/11 rods are used for deep penetration and general purpose welding and can be used on dirty or somewhat rusted metal. The 60 series rods do not need to be kept in a oven.

[Jerome Stanek]

My Bil welds for a living and at one time owned a company that welded pullys. He had couple of Millers that he ended up selling and bought one of these. He said it was nice having just one welder to do any type of welding.

https://www.harborfreight.com/omnipr...put-57812.html

[Bill George]

My Bil welds for a living and at one time owned a company that welded pullys. He had couple of Millers that he ended up selling and bought one of these. He said it was nice having just one welder to do any type of welding.

https://www.harborfreight.com/omnipr...put-57812.html

My Primeweld 180 does the same and comes with a spool gun all for less than $600. I added a scratch lift start TIG which I never use. Took class years ago so I do know how to TIG but its slow and I use the MIG nearly all the time. The Primeweld also comes with a real warranty and USA support. not just 90 days!

https://primeweld.com/collections/mig-welders

[Jack Frederick]

I did a lot of powerhouse/refinery pipe welding. At a time, I could pass any test on any process. Those days are long gone. Today, I have to be right on the weld to do a job I can stand to look at. Eyesight or the lack of it. I prefer my welders Blue and currently run a Miller 211 mig machine. It is pre-inverter and excellent. I wish I had gone for the 252, but the 211 has been a great machine. It is 110/220 v. I have run it on 110, but it is not worth the effort. Go to Miller.com and they have a “what welder” page under equipment. Stop by a Miller/Lincoln Welding Supply and look/chat. Pick the mig and go from there. Like everything else, speed costs money. How fast do you want to go? My suggestion is to go with a good mig machine with gas. Yes, it costs a bit more, but skipping the flux core makes it easier, imho, to learn. You are looking at pure metal and can see your tie-ins, judge your penetration, etc so much easier than having to deal with the flux running over the puddle. There are a lot of Multi-process machines out there. They have been on the market for 10-15 yrs now I think and perhaps they are as good as they say, but I’ll take one machine to learn on and become proficient at one process any day and the best for a beginner is gas/mig. If you don’t stick with it and dabble with it and try multi processes it is an exercise in frustration. I’m thinking that most of what you will do is steel, flat, angle, tube. I keep a stock of rod and off-cuts of up to 4” sq stock. Steel prices like everything else is up and up. A good fit up, when you decide to try to make something is essential. I have an Evolution 14” metal chop saw and it is terrific. Look at the used machine market. Whoever ends up with my 211 when it goes is going to get a heck of a machine.
A funny story. Back in the late 90’s/early 00’s I decided to get aback into tig. It is everyone’s favorite process and I was a hand with it. I did a lot of it on nukes and SS welding is wonderful…once you become proficient. I was doing some car restoration and bought a Miller 135 110v mig and a Synchrowave 180 for stick and tig. 110v machines are not worth bothering with imo, but I was stoked to have the Synchro. I,of course, figured I’d step right back into the tig. Stick is no problem for me, but the tig? Once you get set-up I was, “ha, piece of cake…” Well, I fired that rig up hit the pedal on my clown car, because that is what it quickly became. Controlling the the heat by the pedal, handling the torch and feeding the wire, once so smooth a process shocked the hell out of me. I was so far behind I couldn’t believe it. I knew I could get it back, but the investment in time and energy simply could not be there. I had a good business to run and a family and realized I simply could not invest the time necessary given the demands of every day life. You may be a prodigy and be able to thread the needle. Some do, but “it ain’t me babe.”

[Marc Fenneuff]

Last year I got tired of waiting for my welder buddy to get back to me, so I bought a 120/240V welder from Eastwood. It will do flux core and gas MIG. I used it for a couple small jobs with 14ga sheet steel.

My advice is if you want to weld, make sure to get the right PPE and have the basic tools for fixturing. I got gloves and magnets from TSC and an auto-darkening welding helmet from CL. You also will need something to cut your steel and eventually something to bend it. So, angle grinder at the very least. I did fine with a jig saw for my little jobs. But if you want to fab anything you are going to want to make square cuts (cutoff saw).

Once you have a simple kit and have learned the basic safety steps, practice practice practice. A community college class is a great idea.

And as was said previously, you really don't want to be cutting, grinding, or welding metal anywhere near where you do your woodworking.

[Tom M King]

You can weld stuff thicker with the little flux core welders with preheat that you otherwise couldn't. My standing seam roofing edge folder got misplaced, so I made one with a couple of visegrips and angle iron from Ace Hardware. This was before I bought the newer MIG machine in my earlier pictures in this thread, but after I had given away the 251, so the only welder I had working at the time was the 140.

These are uncleaned typical flux core wire welds. I ground down to bare metal on both the Visegrips and angle iron. Grinding is something you normally don't have to fool with using flux core, but it will give a cleaner weld, and fractionally quicker bonding. I clamped the Visegrips where I wanted them, and heated them as much as I could with a couple of MAPP gas torches.

This is still my current edge folding user for several roofs after making this one. I put duct tape on the working surfaces to keep from scratching the coating on the roofing panels. It works great. You can see how clean and pretty the finished fold on the panel to the left is.

I don't think I knocked the flux off those welds the day I needed it and cobbled it together quickly, but the flux has probably fallen off from just being tossed around since then. I cannot make a pretty weld with flux cored, but at least they don't fail.

[Rich Engelhardt]

This little rascal has gotten some rave reviews.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97vZ-Kcdutg

It fills a niche. A very, very, very light duty niche.

[Tom M King]

Thanks for that video. That looks like a fun little toy.

[Michael Schuch]

I bought a Lincoln 225 MIG welder about 30 years ago. The stupid thing just keeps running, and running, and.... I will never be able to upgrade because the stupid thing will never die!

I would HIGHLY RECCOMEND getting a MIG and running it with a Argon-CO2 mix! IMHO MIG is the quickest and easiest to learn with the shortest path to making solid reliable welds.

Miller, Lincoln and Hobart all make excellent welders but I honestly believe they are overkill for a home hobbyist doing weekend projects. I do not know much about the Harbor Freight welders. PrimeWeld has a good reputation for solid Chinese equipment. I have a YESWELDER plasma cutter which is bare bones as far as features but high on power per dollar and has worked very well for me. I don't know the YESWELDER MIGs well enough to reccomend them. I think EverLast, WeldPro and Eastwood also have good reputations for Chinese welders. I would reccomend a 220v welder to make sure you have plenty of amperage for what ever you want to tackle. When you are just starting it seems like it is easier to run a weld too hot and cut down on the power than it is too start at too low of a power and try to work up to hotter levels. Don't get sucked into fancy useless features. My Lincoln has a wire speed dial, power / amperage rotary switch and an on/off switch... I haven't found a need for anything else.

I researched self darkening helmets a ton and found the YESWELDER helmets to be by far the best bang per buck. My YESWELDER helmet is a MASSIVE improvement over my old Harbor Freight self darkening helmet. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...e?ie=UTF8&th=1 This helmet has made the biggest improvement in my welds in the past 30 years, I can simply see what I am doing with very good resolution and clarity.

I started with a Century flux core wirefeed welder and gave up, figuring welding was just beyond my abilities. A friend told me I needed a MIG and sold me his Lincoln... after which he went out and bought a bigger fancier Lincoln welder. Again, I don't think a name brand is necessary for a home welder like it was 30+ years ago when the choices were so much more limited. Just bite the bullet and buy the CO2-Argon mix bottle and bypass the frustration of a flux core wirefeed!

Whether actually better or not I think spools of welding wire from a real welding supply shop make a smoother weld than HF spools.

My hand holding the torch is always resting on something for stability. Even when I was young and spry resting my welding hand against something made a huge difference. Once you are able to run a decent puddle (of molten steel) try making little circles while laying down the weld... like a continuous string of cursive lower case "e"s. You will eventually figure out that the sound of the weld will tell you whether it is going down smoothly. When it doesn't sound right it isn't right. I don't now how to explain it other than it just takes experience. I spent a day trying to get my weld to go down smoothly... it took the entire day for me to figure out my gas cylinder was empty! Refilled the cylinder and I knew everything was fine after the first crackle.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Thanks for that video. That looks like a fun little toy.

That's exactly what I'm thinking.
There's a ton of Youtube videos where the presenter runs a tack or two or three, and I think to myself, "If only I had a little simple stick welder - - "

[Rich Konopka]

I bought a Lincoln 225 MIG welder about 30 years ago. The stupid thing just keeps running, and running, and.... I will never be able to upgrade because the stupid thing will never die!

I would HIGHLY RECCOMEND getting a MIG and running it with a Argon-CO2 mix! IMHO MIG is the quickest and easiest to learn with the shortest path to making solid reliable welds.

Miller, Lincoln and Hobart all make excellent welders but I honestly believe they are overkill for a home hobbyist doing weekend projects. I do not know much about the Harbor Freight welders. PrimeWeld has a good reputation for solid Chinese equipment. I have a YESWELDER plasma cutter which is bare bones as far as features but high on power per dollar and has worked very well for me. I don't know the YESWELDER MIGs well enough to reccomend them. I think EverLast, WeldPro and Eastwood also have good reputations for Chinese welders. I would reccomend a 220v welder to make sure you have plenty of amperage for what ever you want to tackle. When you are just starting it seems like it is easier to run a weld too hot and cut down on the power than it is too start at too low of a power and try to work up to hotter levels. Don't get sucked into fancy useless features. My Lincoln has a wire speed dial, power / amperage rotary switch and an on/off switch... I haven't found a need for anything else.

I researched self darkening helmets a ton and found the YESWELDER helmets to be by far the best bang per buck. My YESWELDER helmet is a MASSIVE improvement over my old Harbor Freight self darkening helmet. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...e?ie=UTF8&th=1 This helmet has made the biggest improvement in my welds in the past 30 years, I can simply see what I am doing with very good resolution and clarity.

I started with a Century flux core wirefeed welder and gave up, figuring welding was just beyond my abilities. A friend told me I needed a MIG and sold me his Lincoln... after which he went out and bought a bigger fancier Lincoln welder. Again, I don't think a name brand is necessary for a home welder like it was 30+ years ago when the choices were so much more limited. Just bite the bullet and buy the CO2-Argon mix bottle and bypass the frustration of a flux core wirefeed!

Whether actually better or not I think spools of welding wire from a real welding supply shop make a smoother weld than HF spools.

My hand holding the torch is always resting on something for stability. Even when I was young and spry resting my welding hand against something made a huge difference. Once you are able to run a decent puddle (of molten steel) try making little circles while laying down the weld... like a continuous string of cursive lower case "e"s. You will eventually figure out that the sound of the weld will tell you whether it is going down smoothly. When it doesn't sound right it isn't right. I don't now how to explain it other than it just takes experience. I spent a day trying to get my weld to go down smoothly... it took the entire day for me to figure out my gas cylinder was empty! Refilled the cylinder and I knew everything was fine after the first crackle.

Great advice thanks. I will look at the yeswelder helmet

[Tom M King]

I like to keep C25 and C10 cylinders on hand. The pulse mode on my welder asks for C10 and it works better for welding thicker steel too. Pulse mode works much better on thinner metal because it's much less likely to put too much heat in and melt through. Some Tractor Supply stores have a cylinder exchange program, but they don't carry C10.

https://www.millerwelds.com/resource...y-applications


https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/pr...hoC9E8QAvD_BwE

[Chris Parks]

Alex said a lot, but I think this needs more attention.

There is a learning curve. Temperature, amps, speed, angle, wire/rod size, gas/coatings, material, thickness… just some of the variables that will affect a weld. For some welds -who cares?? But, I had a newbie welder friend that bought a welder and fabbed his own utility trailer. He was so proud, till a weld failed as he was pulling it down the road. With one side of the trailer digging into the gravel road it pulled him into the ditch. No injuries, but it could have.

We weld with steel because we expect to put it under a lot of stress. Your welds need to be as strong or stronger than the rest of the structure. One bad thing about mig is they come out looking pretty after little practice. But that prettiness can hide some pretty bad defects.
Consider taking a class at a community education center. You will have an experienced welder/teacher to evaluate your work to help you get better.

Until you get good, stay away from any critical projects; and you may not realize a weld was critical until it is too late (personal story: when I was about 12 or 13 my dad was tasked with welding some black pipe into coat racks for our church. He let me weld a couple times. I thought I did well. A year later a kid was hanging on one and it broke. He slid down the pipe and the sharp metal from the broken weld put a nice cut on his head. Before the days of instant litigation or it could have been bad for the church and my family.)

It took me 5 years of night courses to learn how to weld Oxy, Arc. MIG & TIG right up to pressure welding on small bore pipe with a TIG. I can quote instances of people getting killed because they thought they knew how to weld. Tig is electronic oxy welding and refines the process somewhat especially aluminium which everyone seems to rave about but it can all be done with two gases and the right skill level, the electrons just make it easier and there is nothing wrong with that.