Welding Tips and Tricks

what can you do to minimize the cathodic etching of a weld puddle? i got a syncrowave 200 and its set at 10 balance at max penetration. i would like to see more of the shiny puddle and not so much of the etching like the pic below which i got off jodys site, any suggestions?

The weld looks good , what rod are you using . The 4043 is usually not as shiney as 5356 rod ,But I think (i might have them mixed up) but 4043 will just turn black if anodized? And It looks like from the picture that is about the least amount of cleaning that you will be able to get down to . The start has a little more etching so you might be able to add a little more heat to start your puddle fast then pick up the pace a touch, or pre heat with a torch so you get a fster start ,but it gets a little difficult to weld so fast that you do not get the correct penitration as well.

Try adding some helium in your shielding gas mix - I haven't tried it myself, but Jody has a tip webpage and video about it. In his video, it really seems to narrow the etched band!
http://www.weldingtipsandtricks.com/tig ... argon.html

But even with all the tricks, your "as welded" joint is still likely to have *some* white etching visible. I've had really good results removing it completely with minimal effort with just a little scotchbrite polishing. The white etching it turns out, is really thin and so can be easy to remove. The scotch brite polishing does leave a "grain" pattern (tiny little scratches) but they can be uniform in direction if you do the polishing in a uniform direction. I polished the picture below in the direction of the bead. You can actually feel with the pad polishing by hand, when you break through the oxide layer and reach the softer "parent metal" aluminum, as the friction on the polishing pad will increase. It is a good idea to clean up after the polishing with some soap and water, or some type of solvent, but the polishing operation itself can be just a one step, requiring only a small bit of elbow grease.

PS - in the picture below, don't mind my funky "weave" bead (it was an experiment ) But, do check out how the details of the bead are still highly visible, while all white etching is completely removed.

To be honest Artisian, that is pretty good tight etching. Not gonna get much less than that me thinks. As for the shiny bead, it's kind of an elusive combo of several things all coming together at once, but namely heat and travel speed. You'll just have to play around until you find what brings that on and then try to be consistant in repeating it as wanted. It is not always tho an indicator of a "better" weld, so keep it in perspective. Just like the stack of dimes thing, ..... you don't have to have that look to have a sound weld. Looks good tho, ...... weld on!

Trackmaster welder wrote:To be honest Artisian, that is pretty good tight etching. Not gonna get much less than that me thinks. As for the shiny bead, it's kind of an elusive combo of several things all coming together at once, but namely heat and travel speed. You'll just have to play around until you find what brings that on and then try to be consistant in repeating it as wanted. It is not always tho an indicator of a "better" weld, so keep it in perspective. Just like the stack of dimes thing, ..... you don't have to have that look to have a sound weld. Looks good tho, ...... weld on!

i wish that was a bead i made but that pic i posted 1st is the pic i got from jodys site (sorry for the confusion, edited 1st post) that bead is exactly what i want it too look like though, i know there will always be some etching like stated above, but i work on alot of aluminum piping and i always seem to be brushing off the beads to reduce the etching and i always leave scratch marks, would a buffing wheel make a difference with mothers aluminum polish? i might try the scotch bright thing tomarrow thx

this is a little project i did, and this is what i was talking about, see all the etching around it. I wired brushed it and you can now see the scratch markes bad for apperence

The video I referenced earlier covers a lot of content about Helium shielding gas, so let me point out the content on the cleaning action / frosty band:

http://www.weldingtipsandtricks.com/tig ... argon.html

Viewing the video, fast forward to about 6:12, then you can see the comparison. Jody says:

"You can see the frosty band of cleaning action, extending about 1/4" away from the edge of the bead on that with straight argon.

We didn't change the AC balance and using a Helium mix, we got very little cleaning action outside the joint, and that's a good thing for some jobs.

On some jobs we don't want that cleaning band, like on nice polished aluminum, especially on marine hardware and things, folks have come to expect they're not going to see a lot of that cleaning action / frosty band outside the bead."

ya just saw the vid, thx jakeru. will also give that a shot, too bad it starts to get expensive with helium. thx everyone for your inputs

these work well for reducing the elbow grease involved in polishing: http://www.harborfreight.com/3-inch-pne ... 99934.html

I'd probably take a red scotch brite and scuff down the etching first, then try out a few compounds. 3m super duty (don't remember the #, hardly ever use it) is very aggressive, perhaps too aggressive. 3M 5973 (perfect it II) is a good general purpose polishing compound and should work for your situation. perfect it III is a little finer. you can use meguiars final inspection to take any excess compound off afterwards, it leaves no residue. just spray a bit on a clean shop towel and wipe.

Here is one simple way to narrow the frost...

use a smaller cup and less gas flow. the frost will only go where the gas shielding is.
this is where the old school , non gas lens collet bodies can help too.

try a #6 with only about 13-15 cfh

its a tight rope because you need enough shielding gas to get a clean puddle. but too much just makes the frost go everywhere , even with ac balance maxed,

good luck

jody

thx everyone for their inputs, here is a pic of the final pipe i did with a little brushing so it wouldnt look so bad, i think it looks pretty good except the excess etching . if anyone cares, i will try to post another pipe with all the tips that everyone gave me and see which one works best