Welding Tips and Tricks

About 50 years ago I was employed for a while as a production stick welder by a company that is no longer.
3 or 4 years ago I purchased a Eastwood Mig 175 and just purchased a used 2016 AHP 200x a little over a week ago.

I have been trying to practice on carbon steel over the past week and like most newbies I am spending more time sharpening tungstens than I am actually welding. But, I am getting better. Aside from contaminating my tungsten too often I do have additional problems that I hope someone can help me with.

I am getting VERY FINE spatter on my practice welds and am also getting what appears to be soot on my practice mild steel. The FINE SPATTER is also getting on the end of the torch cup.

Using an AHP Alphatig with a #9 CK torch. 2% Lanthanated 3/32 tungsten. Gas lens kit. 1/16" filler wire.

Mill scale has been completely sanded off of the mild steel and the pieces have been wiped off with acetone. Filler wire has been wiped with acetone. Using Argon and the flow meter shows 15cfm. I have tried increasing the cfm slightly up and slightly down, which does not seem to make a difference. Have tried both a #6 and a #7 cup, which doesn't seem to matter.

When I bought the welder I also got some "used" tungstens with it. I thought that perhaps they were contaminated so I bought some new 2% Lanthanated. That was not the problem, still getting spatter with totally new tungstens.. The screen on my gas lens collet body ended up with some fine spatter too, so I put a new collet body in the torch, which didn't help. Also changed to collet itself. Again still getting fine spatter. And, if I keep welding, my tungsten balls up badly.

I am at my wits end. I would appreciate comments from anyone who thinking that they can help.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

Welcome to the forum, Tom.

Hello Tom
Make sure you have the tig torch hooked up to the (-)minus terminal, and the ground in the (+)plus terrminal. If they are reversed (electrode positive) you would ball up electrode rather quickly. Hope this helps.

Torch is in negative (-) and ground is in positive (+).

Is this correct for DC welding steel and also AC welding aluminum?
I am DC welding steel.

Yes that is correct. Along with the possible gas issues already mentioned, there is the possibility of poor quality steel. Even if it’s been ground clean I’ve had the fine spatter you mentioned on very old steel and some that was just of a poor metallurgical quality. Try different metal as well. A small piece of new cold rolled is a good place to start. If the problem persists then it probably is a gas issue. Gas issues can be frustrating due to the seaming endless possibilities.

After thinking about things over the weekend I went out to my garage/shop yesterday and found a couple of issues.

#1 -- I checked all of the fittings for my gas line to insure that they were tight and discovered that the gas line was not fully seated in the quick dis-connect on the front of my AHP. The gas line was attached and would not fall off but it was not seated and "locked" fully. I pulled it out and re-installed the gas line making sure that it was fully seated and that the locking ring snapped fully closed.

That was the problem and why I was getting spatter, which I am no longer getting.

#2 -- Over the weekend another thing that I had thought about was the fact that my filler rod could be bad. I had been wiping down my filler rod with acetone but never really looked closely at the rod itself. Upon closer inspection I found that the filler had an occasional tiny spot of rust on it. So, I will use the rod for practice only. I have ordered some new filler rod to solve the problem.

My welds are now coming out acceptable to good. I will continue to practice different set-ups on steel and will be making my first attempts at welding aluminum with a day or so.

Thank you to everyone for your help.

Tom Rum wrote:After thinking about things over the weekend I went out to my garage/shop yesterday and found a couple of issues.

#1 -- I checked all of the fittings for my gas line to insure that they were tight and discovered that the gas line was not fully seated in the quick dis-connect on the front of my AHP. The gas line was attached and would not fall off but it was not seated and "locked" fully. I pulled it out and re-installed the gas line making sure that it was fully seated and that the locking ring snapped fully closed.

That was the problem and why I was getting spatter, which I am no longer getting.

#2 -- Over the weekend another thing that I had thought about was the fact that my filler rod could be bad. I had been wiping down my filler rod with acetone but never really looked closely at the rod itself. Upon closer inspection I found that the filler had an occasional tiny spot of rust on it. So, I will use the rod for practice only. I have ordered some new filler rod to solve the problem.

My welds are now coming out acceptable to good. I will continue to practice different set-ups on steel and will be making my first attempts at welding aluminum with a day or so.

Thank you to everyone for your help.

Glad you found the problem!