Welding Tips and Tricks

So im training for an X ray 3g on one inch plate. I suppose my instructor is doing the best he can with me, and I see improvement every week, however I cant help but wonder what other folks think about this test and what i should expect, any advice is welcome.
Bob

Slag inclusions and voids and pieces if tungstens if you stick and break off the tip are the only things I know of that show up on x Ray.

Thanks for the help, I should have specified this test will be in the smaw process. I will be considering everything except the tungsten, thanks again.

Just keep it clean and let the plate cool.

Here's mine.

http://forum.weldingtipsandtricks.com/v ... f=3&t=7970

Well akyour welds look great, was your root pass completed in the 3g position? It looks like its flat on the bench.

My instructor, god bless his heart is scrutinizing every ripple in the weld. Which is some times discouraging to say the least. I havent seen any ripple-less welds. I guess I wont know for sure until the results come back from the state.

Woodbutcher wrote:Well akyour welds look great, was your root pass completed in the 3g position? It looks like its flat on the bench.

My instructor, god bless his heart is scrutinizing every ripple in the weld. Which is some times discouraging to say the least. I havent seen any ripple-less welds. I guess I wont know for sure until the results come back from the state.

I assure you every pass was 3g vertical up.

You'll get it.

Again, the welds look great. By the amps stated im assuming you were using 1/8 rod. Your root pass is making me think im not holding long enough in the toes, my root doesnt look as thick or as full. But I am feeling more confident because the rest looks very similar to what im seeing in the booth, thanks for your time and encouragement.

Woodbutcher wrote:Again, the welds look great. By the amps stated im assuming you were using 1/8 rod. Your root pass is making me think im not holding long enough in the toes, my root doesnt look as thick or as full. But I am feeling more confident because the rest looks very similar to what im seeing in the booth, thanks for your time and encouragement.

Yeah 1/8" rods.
I think I used 3 different welders ansd 3 different brands of rod throughout the plate.

Weld as hot as you can on the root, and jam the rod tight into the edges.

This is my root pass, I decided to try two stringers instead of a weave, they are laying much flatter than my weave in the root. Sorry it took so long for me to get pictures. I'll get some more uploaded.

This is a little more than half way out, double weave as you can see. I'm running Lincoln Excalibur 1/8 rod at around 120amps with a Miller cst250 inverter machine. Any advice is welcomed.

This is how I did this week, definite improvement, let me know what you all think. This the root pass.

This a few passes out, double weave, getting flatter, holding toes longer.

Looking good. Be conscious of your starts and stops. Try not to stack them on top of each other.
Plan ahead so that you can burn right over the starts/stops of the previous pass. I did a lot of x-ray
on the subs when I was doing the shipyard thing.

That's looking real good.

Thanks guys, looks like the test will be in april, so ive got a couple more months to improve my skills. The main issue now looks like as im welding this thing out the top of the groove gets fuller faster and the bottom inch or so is shallow. This becomes an issue when it comes time to cap, because I need to fill the bottom more without adding too much height to the rest of it. Dont know if that makes any sense, ill see if I can get good pics of this problem. Im trying to complete the five inch plate withough any starts and stops, so I dont want to just run a couple of short beads to build up the bottom. Any thoughts?

G-day WB Yeah your welds are looking good and I can see that it is more full at the top end.
I think there are a couple of reasons for this happening:
One has to do with the change of electrode angle as you go up. Often people have the electrode more square to the plate at the bottom so the molten metal is being punched in. Some new to welding tend to leave there hands in the same position as they traverse up so the angle of the electrode increases the further up they travel. Thus the weld tends to build up more rather than be pushed in. Hope that make sense.
A couple of ways to rectify this is to, if you are using a support for your arms/hands is to move the support up after each electrode or to slide the weld coupon down after each electrode so that you maintain the same electrode angle for each electrode.
Two, the other reason is the change in weave tempo as the weld moves up and the electrode gets shorter. It is really important to be consistent with the tempo the whole way. Some of us old timers would weld with a waltz rhythm i.e. 1,2,3, 1,2,3, 1,2,3 etc, so, weaving at 1 and pausing at the side for 2,3,. the pause at the side (toe of weld) allows the toe to fill a little more thus giving a flatter weld.
So remember to keep the electrode at the same angle (vertically) the whole way up and keep the rhythm consistent. and as Jody says, Get lots of bench time and keep burning them rods.
But your welds are looking good so keep up the good work.
Cheers Andy

Thanks for the advice, I'll pay close attention to those things this week. I weld twice week in the booth and whatever I can cram in at home. I'll keep you posted. Thanks again.

So the test is going to be in the first part of may, which is good because the whole fam damly come down with the crud. Im progressing well, working at it at home, should resume class this week. I'll take some pics and keep you posted.

So my test is in a couple weeks and last week I started having serious issues with arc blow. I dont usually have a problem with arc blow with 1/8 rod, but it has become a real issue on my root and hot pass. I have moved the ground clamp a thousand times with no positive feedback. No pun intended. Any instructors or students out there see this happen after welding for months in a small booth?

Arc blow is a fickle thing. A slight change in something like the quality of input power can make it happen when previously it didn't. Sometimes a combination of which booths are being used and what's going on in there can make the difference.

There are various methods used to make it go away or reduce it such as return clamp repositioning, winding the torch lead around the work piece. Sometimes (often) nothing works and you just have to suck it up. You are probably not allowed to switch to ac as this would certainly make it go away. We were allowed to do this when I was in school and people were getting arc blow.
You can try spacing out the booth occupancy if they are not all full, that will probably help. If that is not possible, advise your teacher/examiner on the day that you are having arc blow probs so they can make changes or allowances. Don't go through your test coupons with arc blow without letting the examiner know.

Thanks for the advice, im pretty sure I have to test dc reverse polarity. Will try the lead wrap idea, ill try anything at this point. Im actually the only one welding at this point, so ive actually tried different machines and different booths with no change. I have the coupon tacked hard at the top with the ground clamp above it normally. Everything was going great until a couple weeks ago when I started having this problem. When welding the root I can get within an inch of the top of the coupon, then arc blow. I've learned that I can drop my elbow and get the rod angle steeper and work it and I can get to the top. However it looks hideous, and im afraid it may not be clean weld. Not sure. Ive never taken an ex ray test, not sure if that portion would pass.

Don't be afraid to fail. You can always try again.

You're absolutely right, I guess when you put so much time into something you pressure yourself to the point where nothing but perfection will do. Pass or fail I am twice the welder I was a year ago, and confident enough to say so.

Woodbutcher wrote:You're absolutely right, I guess when you put so much time into something you pressure yourself to the point where nothing but perfection will do. Pass or fail I am twice the welder I was a year ago, and confident enough to say so.

Here's a big, fat, "LIKE" for that comment.

Steve S

Well thanks for that, however I've been wrestling with this since I replied to Poland. I would say to not be confused with 'don't be afraid to fail' with 'its ok to fail'. Big difference. A lot of us, including myself weld for a living, this test could mean a job which feeds my family. Its not ok to fail. If I fail this test, to retest it requires an additional fifty hours of training before retest. Which would take place forty five minutes from home, hopefully after eight hours of work, if the Instructor had time and chose to hold the class. So after rethinking this, I think a prudent person would be afraid to fail, and I m ok with that. Just a side note, God bless my instructor, he's fantastic.