Welding Tips and Tricks

Hello

I call myself a beginner welder. Basically learning off youtube. I can't get consistent results. I weld once every few months which doesn't help with getting better at it but anyways...This past weekend I welded a winch receiver onto my trailer using the same settings I used when welding a trailer hitch (see attached picture of hitch) but for some reason I had no sizzle this time which reminded me of tig welding it just seemed to flow into the puddle.
On the hitch I welded horizontal
On trailer I was vertical and downwards. Does this have to with it? Maybe wrong setting or bad ground?

See picture for welder setting.
Steel was approx 1/4-5/16 thick
Thermal Arc 252i

Any help would be much appreciated. Thank you

Looks good. I don't worry about sound much unless its some ungodly popping or stuttering.

The welds have good wet toes, shiny, well sized and minimal spatter. Thats about as good as it gets without some non-destructive testing.

Ok Thanks Pete!

Like's been said - if the weld looks OK it's all good & don't worry - but something must have changed - dumb question but on the 252i you can change inductance settings - not sure how you access it on menu but is it possible that's got changed by accident ? or are you using a different gas mix either intentionally or swapped a cylinder out that's mis labelled ? either would change how the machine welds & require different in/min for a given volts much like changing wire diameter.