Welding Tips and Tricks

Boomer63 wrote:What would you consider to be the most important aspects of welding, across all the process? I would put 'angles' as my number one, because no matter with SMAW, GTAW, GMAW or what ever, correct angle is so, so important.

WerkSpace wrote:I would put SAFETY as number one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt3EYIAeTsA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DP5l9yYt-g

Boomer63 wrote:What would you consider to be the most important aspects of welding, across all the process? I would put 'angles' as my number one, because no matter with SMAW, GTAW, GMAW or what ever, correct angle is so, so important.

Boomer63 wrote:What would you consider to be the most important aspects of welding, across all the process? I would put 'angles' as my number one, because no matter with SMAW, GTAW, GMAW or what ever, correct angle is so, so important.

airrj wrote:Gary,

I know that you are looking for welding specific techniques but I have to second the safety topic, and I am glad to hear that your program is drilling the message into them.

I am a noob with a moderate amount of experience time. What I find myself doing most, or wishing I did after I screwed up, is looking at the joint and visualizing how I am going to have to move my arms to get that correct angle that you talked about. As you see Jody do in many of his videos, a dry run to make sure that his hand placement with work to prop through the entire weld. My consistent biggest mistake that I catch myself doing, sometimes even after I do a dry run, is that I find myself way out of position midway through a weld. I will be concentrating on the puddle, the motion, etc, and then I see that I have the gun/torch/stick laid way down at a bad angle.

So I guess that I am just saying angle is important like you said, but for me I have to concentrate ahead of time to really focus to get my motion correct to keep myself out of trouble. I have started making three specific dry passes for each weld that I do. First to confirm that my hand placement or propping is acceptable, the second pass is to focus on how I have to move to keep a proper angle, and the third to put it all together and try to build some muscle memory for the joint.

I see that this become more second nature with experience, but for someone learning, and for the person like myself that may go two weeks without welding something I think the mental exercise ahead of the weld bead is a big help.

Thanks.
R.J.

Rick_H wrote:Reading the puddle is very important, it tells you nearly everything you need to know about how your welding, angle, feed, arc length etc.

WerkSpace wrote:I found this video on youtube about reading the puddle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlXfGdSNfYc

Rick_H wrote:Reading the puddle is very important, it tells you nearly everything you need to know about how your welding, angle, feed, arc length etc.

Otto Nobedder wrote:Gary, here's my two cents (so far),

All joints shrink when welded. The fit must anticipate this.

You can tack your ell dead-on 90*, weld it out, and wonder why it's now 88*. The short side of the ell shrunk just as much as the long side, but with less metal in the radius to shrink, it drew inward.

You can cut your butt pieces to print length minus takeout for the gap, forget shrinkage, and end up 1/16" short per joint.

You can weld a tab to a piece of angle, and see the angle go from straight to bowed at the new joint.

Shrinkage must be compensated for in the fit, and this is learned by feel and experience. An awareness of this on the job will prevent many headache fixes.

Perhaps not the most critical thing, but to be made aware of it in school beats learning it through thirty cut-outs with your new boss breathing down your neck.
Thanks, Steve. What you are talking about is sort of like my "25%" of what it takes to be a real welder/fabricator:
25% actual welding skill
25% metallurgy, choosing proper filler metals, machine set up and why, etc
25% fit up and layout; knowing what the metal is going to do and why, when you begin to manipulate it
25% professionalism; knowing how to act, think, speak and behave like a pro
Gary

Steve S

Rick_H wrote:A little off topic but how do your students practice? At a bench, clean metal etc? I was in a class once doing pipe welding and the young welder in the booth behind kept saying how easy this was... I leaned over and told him yes this is easy, were sitting at a bench with test coupons. Real world is laying on your back, awkward body position on a dirty floor, rusty or old material and every minute your down is $1000s or tens of thousands of dollars. I think all students need to be smacked with some real world before they head out.

I second the fab and fit up, Otto is dead nuts on. It took me years to understand how to get things square while welding, accounting for pull, shrinkage, bowing etc. I made a frame for a cabinet tonight 72" x 29" x 12" I was 1/16" out of square and it bothered me...my co-workers just laughed. I made everything in an hour, mig welded, with a 24" square, tape measure and 12" speed square.

Reading the puddle is very important, it tells you nearly everything you need to know about how your welding, angle, feed, arc length etc.

Boomer63 wrote:

Rick_H wrote:A little off topic but how do your students practice? At a bench, clean metal etc? I was in a class once doing pipe welding and the young welder in the booth behind kept saying how easy this was... I leaned over and told him yes this is easy, were sitting at a bench with test coupons. Real world is laying on your back, awkward body position on a dirty floor, rusty or old material and every minute your down is $1000s or tens of thousands of dollars. I think all students need to be smacked with some real world before they head out.

I second the fab and fit up, Otto is dead nuts on. It took me years to understand how to get things square while welding, accounting for pull, shrinkage, bowing etc. I made a frame for a cabinet tonight 72" x 29" x 12" I was 1/16" out of square and it bothered me...my co-workers just laughed. I made everything in an hour, mig welded, with a 24" square, tape measure and 12" speed square.

Reading the puddle is very important, it tells you nearly everything you need to know about how your welding, angle, feed, arc length etc.

I start with giving them every advantage possible. They need to be as comfortable as they can be so they can get started. I move them along fast! They WILL pass a 3G 3/8" plate test within the first nine/ten weeks, of 16 - 20 hour weeks - in addition to learning everything else they need to learn. They know that being too comfortable is not the 'real world', and some ask me about it. I tell them that they WILL grow into welders who can handle out of position welding.

The Technical Certificate Program here is five, eight week sections. About midpoint through section four, I have them spend a week or so on what I call 'junk welding'. This is thick to thin material, rusty, nasty material, very out of position, filling insane gaps, doing wild and strange manipulations, etc. It helps to make them adaptable.

I sure ain't perfect and my program is growing!
Gary

Boomer63 wrote:

airrj wrote:Gary,

I know that you are looking for welding specific techniques but I have to second the safety topic, and I am glad to hear that your program is drilling the message into them.

I am a noob with a moderate amount of experience time. What I find myself doing most, or wishing I did after I screwed up, is looking at the joint and visualizing how I am going to have to move my arms to get that correct angle that you talked about. As you see Jody do in many of his videos, a dry run to make sure that his hand placement with work to prop through the entire weld. My consistent biggest mistake that I catch myself doing, sometimes even after I do a dry run, is that I find myself way out of position midway through a weld. I will be concentrating on the puddle, the motion, etc, and then I see that I have the gun/torch/stick laid way down at a bad angle.

So I guess that I am just saying angle is important like you said, but for me I have to concentrate ahead of time to really focus to get my motion correct to keep myself out of trouble. I have started making three specific dry passes for each weld that I do. First to confirm that my hand placement or propping is acceptable, the second pass is to focus on how I have to move to keep a proper angle, and the third to put it all together and try to build some muscle memory for the joint.

I see that this become more second nature with experience, but for someone learning, and for the person like myself that may go two weeks without welding something I think the mental exercise ahead of the weld bead is a big help.

Thanks.
R.J.

Thank you, RJ! Hearing from a "noob" is especially important to me because I just don't remember what that experience was like! You have given me something that I must incorporate into my 'lesson' .. the idea that ... how would I put it? That you need to be mentally prepared to move your body in physical space to get the job done? No ... too complex.

Need to think about this, but content that is important!
Thanks,
Gary

Rick_H wrote:A little off topic but how do your students practice? At a bench, clean metal etc? I was in a class once doing pipe welding and the young welder in the booth behind kept saying how easy this was... I leaned over and told him yes this is easy, were sitting at a bench with test coupons. Real world is laying on your back, awkward body position on a dirty floor, rusty or old material and every minute your down is $1000s or tens of thousands of dollars. I think all students need to be smacked with some real world before they head out.

I second the fab and fit up, Otto is dead nuts on. It took me years to understand how to get things square while welding, accounting for pull, shrinkage, bowing etc. I made a frame for a cabinet tonight 72" x 29" x 12" I was 1/16" out of square and it bothered me...my co-workers just laughed. I made everything in an hour, mig welded, with a 24" square, tape measure and 12" speed square.

Reading the puddle is very important, it tells you nearly everything you need to know about how your welding, angle, feed, arc length etc.

subwayrocket wrote:I'm a noob . With a few months under my belt, fwiw , I think penetration, heat input, cleanliness and porosity are very important . I read and studied on my own for about a year before ever striking an arc. With a few months seat time now and mistakes, I understand more how important those things are, because sometimes I can make what looks like a good weld, but those things have effects that may not cause a problem until later.
Here's another more "general" learning thing, I also think that it's important for someone that is totally new and never welded to understand that it takes seat time, and NOT to get discouraged when they keep making a mess.
Analogy: I ride/race dirt bikes , also play guitar for many years ... things like racing, Guitar, TIG are HARD , not everyone can do it, and there is a learning curve . People buy a dirt bike, a guitar, a TIG welder ...they need to understand that you will be bad at it for a while...and this is normal .