Welding Tips and Tricks

hello new member saying hay.

my name is mike and i own a miller syncrowave 200 runner. i really like it.
i work in a auto performance shop and like the fabrication. i read some stuff on the forum here and hope i can gather info to further my weld quality

i see alot of problems here people have with aluminum. Personally since i weld thin pipes for turbo chargeing some times i can make it look good and some times i feel i should have done a better job .
some days i will pig up a peace and it will look really nice and anther day I just dont have it

I personally have never played with the ballence settings in ac welding and pretty much adjusted my self to the welders settings. i sorry as i can remember all the tungtens name but i own the red the orange and green 100%

at first i hated the 100% than i swittched to the orange with a pionted tip but noticed after welding a little bit the tip splits in the center and i had to resahrpen quite a bit. so now what i am doing is sharpening the 100% and arking On a scrap peace and letting it ball and then welding away. what I have found it i can leave a flater weld this way with out penitrating into the thin pipe so much.

if anyone has any advice on setting i should play with and things i should try are even some way to keep a good mind set for those days i just caant weld right let me know.

oh yeah I doe use a gas lens colit not sure if # and all tunsten 3/32

i don't weld so much and have little time to practice Untill somone needs parts fabbed as im mostly doing tech work wiring cars and diagnosing hacked up cars are just rare problems.

i really hope that i can odtian info from the pros here to better my welding. ohh and sorry i can not type very well

The best advice I can give as a semi noob is practice, practice , practice. My main job at work is NOT welding but I try to TIG atleast 6 to 10 hours a week to try and get better. Usually I go in on the weekend when the shop is closed grab some junk and weld.Try different positions, thicknesses and so on. I feel the better I can weld difficult stuff the better the easier stuff will be. Good luck.

thanks for the reply
. I dont have muxh practice time but i wanted to try and use the blue tunsten with I read on he other s recomend knteed yhe kid I sent to the welding place brought me the gold 1,5 % lanth he go my 2 othem wich i eold him i wanted 2% and the guy their told him this is what I asked for and said their is no blue> i will have somemore spracticwe comming up but i want my welds to look smaller and i thing for 065 i shout be useing a 1/16 tungsten and filller but I use a 3/32 tungsten and 3/32 filler. im wondering if i need to use what I expect to get what I want. i think that is what my practice needs to be on. trying diferent fillers and tungtin.
i am welding a lot of pipe wich angles change and like aI stated i can do nice work one day and the next not what I want. i have not had many contamination problems. if I goot black soot I think I cuosed it from tourch angle but i think from reading hear im useing to much argon i have been useing 20cfh im thinking tring to drop to 15 but i am unsure if it will help me with a smaller covered weld area. i really want the welds to be spaller and O know it is posible cuase I get parts in that are welded just like that and for the life of me what im useing does not get exactly what Im trying to do

i have the same machine, ill point you in the right direction best i can

i run

15cfm
3/32 lanth tungsten
no gas lense
#6 cup
1/16 or 3/32 "5356 filler rod" 5356 looks much nicer, always bright and shiny, 1/16 feeds alot easier if your feed hand is fast

balance depends on the condition of the metal, if its clean and prepped ill run a 9 on balance, if its dirty ill run a 7 on balance...once you get good it really wont matter aslong as you have a decent clean piece of metal....

try to keep a pair of clean gloves if possible, go slow using step and pause until you get good enough to haul ass..aluminum welding...biggest thing you can do is learn how to feed the filler faster and accurately...

Mike, dont get too caught up in all the isoterics, ..... ie, this tungsten that etc. With a tranformer based squarewave machine like yours, they are fairly forgiving as to tungsten choice. It usually comes down to operator preference. I have used pure (green) tungsten on aluminum and mag. for years and years to do cert. quality welds. Can you use others with great success? Absolutely. For what your describing i would start with a truncated ( slightly blunt point pure tung ) , ball it slightly on DCEP - Prob, 3/32 unless your bead is still to spread out, then drop to 1/16. ( one thing nice about inverters is you can adjust bead width, just FYI ). Balance is kind of as needed, if the material is cast you will need more cleaning, as will pre polished. The polishing process actually imbeds quite deeply grit and compounds into the suface, that to your eye could look no cleaner for welding! If so, without adding rod run your torch along the seam to be welded back and forth slowly adding heat till you see the impurities start to come up and clean off. this also serves to preheat the piece. Thicker work, you may need to preheat with a Flame, heat gun, or old BBQ grill. The add pedal until you get good clean wet in and get going. Don't worry about speed at first, concentrate on heat control #1, and then timing your rod add in's. There are many different looks that can all result in excellent welds. it all depends on what your doing. Stack of dimes looks awesome, but so does proper steady torch movement with regular filler adds. A bit harder to master, but results in a totally different looking weld, that requires more precise heat control. Remember aluminum gets more and more pre-heated if you will, as you weld along, so you have to really watch the edges of your puddle or the footprint and reduce pedal as you go. Otherwise the bead just spreads wider and wider. Some prefer to manually pulse the pedal. Works great for somethings, but as was said before you just gotta practice. Preferably on actuall parts, .... unfortunately. OH yeah, a GAS LENS is always going to be better .... IF you can use it on the joint to be welded. Tig is all about making it happen, not so much worrying about to many details, other than the fundamentals. Good luck Mike, ..... Weld on!

^^^ wow just reading that motivates me to weld more

another tip, when you're working with the thin stuff, set some scrap up, weld for a bit, then blow a big honkin hole in it. you need to know how it acts when it starts to let go so you can tell if you're putting too much heat in. it's easy to do with the thin stuff because it will weld completely different as it starts to heat up.