Welding Tips and Tricks

I'm a hobby welder and purchased one of the Northern Tool self darkening helmets based on the recommendation on this site. I have been extremely pleased with it for stick and MIG welding, but am having a problem with some TIG work I'm trying to do. I'm welding some fairly thin steel and have the machine set accordingly. The problem is that, apparently, the intensity of the light put out by the arc is not sufficient for the helmet as I'm getting a lot of flashing. I have tried various helmet settings and either get the flashing or a condition where the helmet won't lighten at all. Am I expecting too much from this helmet or just not setting it correctly?

Jim

If it has a control for sensitivity then set it onto high.

Mine does the same thing. When you set the sensitivitey on high, it picks up the low amp tig right? but it also picks up ambient light from your enviornment, cuasing it to darken before welding. This effetivley turns it into fixed shade welding helmet. Sometimes if I shake my head like an angry dog, the helmet will flicker bck to shade 3 for a few seconds, giving enough time to start welding. Stupid looking, but it works. can you adjust the lighting in your area? becuase thats the culprit.

-rick

Try putting your helmet outside on a sunny day, facing the direct sun for 4 hours. Some auto-darkening welding helmets are solar powered, and others have battery power. Solar powered ones need to be charged new out of the box, or when they've been kept stored in the dark for a long time. Charging my brother's harbor freight auto-darkening helmet cured its erratic flashing misbehavior.

We purchased some of the less expensive Speedglas helmets for our students to use. The 3M Rep warned me that they may not be suitable for low amp TIG because the intensity of the arc is not enough to trigger the auto dark feature. The 9100 on the other hand works fine. I would say that this is more than likely the case with the Northern Industrial product as well.

Bought a cheap 4 light sensor hood off eBay and am having TIG issues. The helmet goes dark when I touch the foot peddle even with NO arc?????? It lightens back up then it flashes me at arc starts. I am a TIG newby, Miller Synchro 180SD and this sure isn't making things easier. Anyone else run into this? Helmet seems to work fine with my MIG, Gotta test my older auto dark and see if it is different.
Oh first post, hi all!

Bought a cheap 4 light sensor hood off eBay and am having TIG issues.

This is a fairly common problem. Unfortuneately alot of the cheaper auto-darks wont work with low amp tig because the intensity of the arc isnt enough to trigger the sensor. Although your problem is the opposite of what is usually the matter.

If its a cheap one its probably not adjustible, but try adjusting it to a numerically lower shade, like a 8 or a 9, and see if that helps. If it doesnt try to get a refund.

Im a young guy but I was taught to not rely on auto-darks so I use an old school 20 dollar flip down hood from home depot. If your usin a foot pedal Ill assume your sittin down? Go to homey depot and buy a 20 dollar flip down for your tig. Then you can still use your auto-dark for other processes and non-tig position welds. It'll be good to have for a back up if nothing else.