Welding Tips and Tricks

hello all, had to shorten the sidestand on my bike because it stands too vertical. after welding it, used the angle grinder to smooth it out so that it would look like one piece. after I finished it, it's not perfectly round where I had grinded off the excess weld. have watched youtube videos where you couldn't tell that it had been welded. is there a any tips for doing this? Thanks

Don't use a grinder, use a flap disc. Better yet, use a tubing sander so that the paper (in a loop) can flex and deform to maintain the radius and curvature.

If you have ground away too much metal, you can build it back up by laying some stringers with standard weld filler wire, or use SilBr to build it up. Either will be fine.

Yea don't use a hard grinding disc. Use a 40-60 flap disc.

thanks for the responses. initially used a grinding disc to remove areas where I had deposited too much metal. then followed up with the flap disc when I got too close to the base metal. the kickstand is back on the bike. what's a tube sander? never heard of such a thing. is it the small rubber drum that you put a sanding sleeve onto it? Thanks

burnttoast wrote:thanks for the responses. initially used a grinding disc to remove areas where I had deposited too much metal. then followed up with the flap disc when I got too close to the base metal. the kickstand is back on the bike. what's a tube sander? never heard of such a thing. is it the small rubber drum that you put a sanding sleeve onto it? Thanks

i'm wondering if it was also technique.
flap disc you use it opposite way to a grinding disc, which not only makes it last longer but you don't get so much digging as you do with a grinding disc.

LtBadd wrote:

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Thanks

3M Cubitron II Fibre disc to coarse grind close to desired final appearance, then finish it off with a flap disc if you want to eliminate the heavy gouging marks left by the fibre disc and do the final blending. That's what I do, anyways.