I hadn't used my TIG welder for a little bit, and when I tried to weld, no gas would come out no matter what. I opened up the welder and thought maybe the solenoid broke or something. So I tried to bypass this internally. When I tried connecting the gas line directly to the output (it's one of those...

I believe I use 4043 rods, and it doesn't seem to have too much issue welding 6061, but often getting good looking beads without grinding is a challenge on aluminum, especially if the thickness is different. I tried fixing an aluminum hand cart once. Plastic top handle broke off and I welded a solid...

Only asking because my welder goes to 250 amp at most and I think it can really only do about 5 or 6mm of thickness. It also tops out at 120hz for frequency, and lowest is 40. I just find in thick parts I'm getting much better puddling performance at 40hz vs 120hz. It's not a miller or Lincoln, but ...

My question for aluminum welding is, how much heat do you need if you just want to close up a hole in a machined aluminum part? I find pre heat helps, but it needs a lot of torch heat to do it, and honestly a large propane torch is probably better for this (for heat output) than say MAPP or whatever...

Today I saw someone outside a scooter shop stick welding something, and he's not even wearing a mask. I told them aren't they going to end up blind? I got no idea what arc flash will do to you but if you can't even see your arc, how would you weld? Never mind they're welding thin looking pieces of s...

So I finally have a proper stick welder. I'm having issues just touching the rod to the piece. Basically it wants to stick. In the past when I just rigged a TIG welder I just long arc briefly and it worked, but is this really the way to do it? Also restarting a rod seems to be a little tricky. Merel...

So I'm getting a plasma cutter... also made by Andeli. Has integrated air pump so the unit works out of the box, doesn't need air compressor. Thing is rated for 60 amps, can clean cut 12mm, and severance of 20mm (about 3/4") I'm unlikely ever to cut even 12mm, getting it primarily to cut sheet ...

Then what quality 2 x 4 lenses you recommend? I'm thinking it's the uv keeping them from triggering, which is why they have a shield on it. Explains why light triggers it but not the sun.

I used to have one that lasted quite some time, didn't go flashing or anything. I mean I'm just using them because they are a standard size that fits standard helmets. I could buy dedicated helmets but then finding replacement lenses will be harder. What is causing them to fail? The lenses are reall...

I have no idea, if I told you the brand you wouldn't recognize it, but it's Chinese made.

They will work when looking at a bright light, but not welding light or sunlight when they do break.

I don't know if this is normal, but I've been having trouble with auto darkening lens that fits in a standard 2 x 4 inch visor that would lose sensitivity over time. At first it would work with TIG welding, but then it would require increasingly high current for it to trigger, and one of them won't ...

My guess is, either the stick has special composition to deal with it, or the flux somehow keeps water out. Either that or the structure is designed with some allowance for brittle welds? I seen someone talk about using hydrogen torch for welding and I told him the last thing you want in welding is ...

So what do they use to weld it, special electrodes, and presumably only stick welding? I can only ever see myself in the distant future weld stuff sitting under water but not require scuba gears, like in a shallow knee deep pond for example. I wouldn't use a normal welder for the job anyways, I'm su...

Has anyone personally done it before? I mean in welding we want to keep water OUT of it, and so it seems like underwater welding shouldn't be possible right? I doubt I'd ever do it simply because I can't swim let alone scuba dive, and so the only real possibility for me to weld anything underwater i...

I can't use taptalk either, it gives me an access error and the forum is blank.

So I just use web as well.

Is there a difference between welding 8 hours a day, or welding maybe an hour a week (if that)? I know OSHA generally cares about occupational exposure but you can't assume all welders do it for a living. I mainly practice when I got time/money/material just to have a skill... is breathing a little ...

So is zinc vapor THAT bad, like cyanide bad? I ask this because I see people in Taiwan routinely weld galvanized and none of them is wearing any PPE, heck a lot of them don't even bother wearing a welding mask. They either look away (meaning you can't weld right because you got no idea what you are ...

I know we don't do this, but can you simply grind off the galvanized coating from the metal from wherever you intend to weld, as well as any intended heat affected zone? Or does it just smear like oil and it never comes off? I swear people here they just stick weld galvanized metal and they don't ev...

I tried to TIG weld over stick beads and they often sputter like crazy and ruin the tungsten. It doesn't like it for some reason. Yes this is after grinding all the beads flat and welding over the cleaned portions. I think it's because of oxides or flux that got into the metal during welding. Not su...

Can you suggest how I can maintain a straight line absent a guide (such as just laying beads onto a flat piece of metal)? It feels like trying to draw a straight line with a long pencil but holding the far end of the pencil, and it turns out exactly how you'd expect. When welding fillets you can use...

7018 only exists in 3/32 or 1/8 as well as 4mm size. Everything thinner is either 6011 or stainless.

I can't find any 7018 or 7016 locally at all. All they got is 6011, but it's around 15 dollars for a box of 5kg which doesn't seem all that expensive. It's 10 pounds in freedom units. So I'll have to look online or order from china if I want 7018. In china they're about 30 bucks for 50 pounds in fre...

I used to have a Andeli CT520 which is a TIG/Stick/Plasma machine. I loved the plasma feature, even though they can't really cut anything thicker than half inch (it struggles even at that), I don't really encounter anything that thick in my everyday life. Most of it will be sheet metal less than 1/4...

If it's painted, it's probably not galvanized. They have a certain look to it, and I won't weld galvanized, the fume is very bad for you. Does Chrome moly weld any harder than anything else? It's almost Chinese New Year and I'm going to see how much 7018 rods cost here... I bought most of them from ...

I'm using 1/8 inch top for the welding table because it's thick enough to have structure but thin enough to not weight half a ton since it must go up 5 sets of stairs. Expense is also another consideration. Steel is cheap but when the top weights more than 100 pound, it adds up very quick. The botto...