Welding Tips and Tricks

So at work today I had to weld some of the aluminum cabinets I posred pics of in the past. But today was probly the dirtest they have ever been, oil puddles, grind ing dust, things were a nightmare cause i am not allowed to clean anything. I tried just about ever cup/ settings possible. After turning the balance down to 50 and still getting horrible contamination I decided I would try one last thing and set it the dynasty up old school. I balanced the en and ep kept the balance at 50 and turned the frequencu to 60 and what a difference. I guess old school is the way to go sometimes.

The welds look great!

Why is cleaning not allowed? I'm just curious.

-- Pete

We can't clean cause it would take to long. It is a production shop.

That honestly does'nt make sense - if the parts are'nt clean your going to have difficulty welding - it will take longer & either the resulting bad welds will give your product a bad name so you'll lose customers - or it will fail quality control & end up as scrap - unless the guys you work just don't give a s**t - I think it shows management to be ( fill in your suitable word here )

Unless it's been banned by safety guys where you are could the parts not be simply send through a degrease tank - I've seen it on a conveyer line - parts are hooked up & pass down into a heated tank of 1.1.1 Trichloromethane - on leaving they are blown dry & just drop off the end of the line & wait for you to do your welding stuff - if the contamination is bad then ultrasonic agitation can be added.

Not sure adjusting the balance is quite the same as "old school " as this implies a transformer set & an inverter does'nt really replicate this on any setting - but I'm glad you got it dialed in & the last picture looks great.

I agree and I have been trying to get them to clean it cause I am sick of fixing poristy and welds cracking from other people that don't care what their welds look lije. But the owner doesn't care and is greedy, he would rathrt just keep throwing labor at it. And on the dynasty ypu can make them the exact same as a transformer. Switch the wave shape to syn wave, balance out yhe en and ep put your balance at 50 and drop your freq to 60 abd run a pure tungsten whish is what I did

Very strange arrangment that they think reworking parts with defects is quicker than cleaning it in the first place and not getting the defects....

I always try to enphasise to the few young apprentices that we get through the shop that the basis of any good ali weld starts with cleanliness

I kind of get the thinking because we make about 500 cabinets a between all the different styles so it would probly be a big expense. I was try to get them to buy some acetone and have the turret operators wipe them down after they got done punching them but they said the turret guys don't have time and acetone is to expensive I laufhed and said they don't have time to clean the parts but they have time to kick their feet up and watch movies on their phones. We finally got a supervisor on night shift and he was a welder so he is going to try to do something abour it.

What is this " 1.1.1 Trichloromethane" and is it really good at cleaning aluminum? is it safe to use indoors? does it leave any kind of residue? We make scope mounts and after the tapping process the fluid turns to gel in our standard cleaning solution so i we used engine degreaser now and is reeks and i have to wear a mask a gloves and hand wash with water every part so they can get anodized.

Nice job - I'm a fan of old school technology anyway -lol

Old school is fun. I hadn't done that in years but it worked so good yesterdsy I did it agaon today. I might just make this my normal method. Norhing beats old school for outside corner joints, that nice soft arc make such nice beads

If I remember right I don't think 1.1.1. is legal to use in the U.S. anymore, or maybe that's just a company policy where I work, not sure. I do know we're not aloud to use it anymore.

Len

ajlskater1 wrote:Old school is fun. I hadn't done that in years but it worked so good yesterdsy I did it agaon today. I might just make this my normal method. Norhing beats old school for outside corner joints, that nice soft arc make such nice beads

True, I like the arc on my old Airco - does outside corners nicely.

I've heard that the inverter shines when doing fillet welds and using around 120-150hz. First thing I'll try if I get a chance to use one.

I would be worried about clor part of that 1.1.1 stuff. If that means chlorine that is bad news for welding, just like ysing chlorinated break cleaner to clean parts, the fumes that come off can kill you.

I think the only major difference is doing fillet welds on thin material like .050 and under.

Thats about how I have our Dynasty set up for welding anodized, and with using balled pure tungsten. Nice looking welds at any rate. At 50hz, it's also nice not having the machine scream at you. Now if they would offer a switchable high frequency option, all would be well in the aluminum world.

I have had places tell me they don't want the parts clean because they don't want any trace of it such as wire brush marks. Certain volatile solvents in welding areas also change haz-mat protocol and can play a bureocratic nightmare with regards to insurance issues.

As it is, I don't clean anything unless it's noticably contaminated. Mostly I just wipe it off with a dry paper towel.

Thanks jeff. I think I have a valid argument now to do at least something for cleaning them and now the supervisor witnessed it. We had to get 50 of them ground tonight, well out of the 50 I reworked 23 for porosity and cracking welds plus I still had to wrld my normal 10 to get 50. Glad I figured out this little trick mine all ground clean and no cracks:)

ajlskater1 have you tried you setting with the advanced square wave instead of sine wave? i find this works very nicly as well!

Yep I havev tried every wave shape, cup, tungstens, gas flow. Actually last night I had the dirtest parts ever I tried everything and nothing worked, I just gave up and welded them. Back before they stopped caring about the cleaning I used use advanced square 80 balance 200 freq and 15 cfh on the fillet part and just dropped the balance to 70 and upped thevgas to 20 cfh for everything else. I miss those days lolm wish I still had pics from then I could weld them so nice.