Welding Tips and Tricks

Hello,

First off I’ve typically used your standard mig and flux wire but I am using a new flux for work. It’s called wokadur Nie 1.6mm. The issue I am having is the wire consistently breaks at the rollers. Tension on the rollers are about 50%, they are 1.6 (1-16) rollers. My liner is made up to 1.6mm wire as well. When I take out the wire from the liner it feel like there’s a lot of restriction. (I’ve replaced the liner and still have the same issues). Sometimes I can weld 15 minutes with no issues or today I can barely get a 1 inch weld down before it breaks again. Most of the time I can feel it vibrating my gun as if it’s having trouble feeding.

I’ve used new wire, new rollers, new liner and still have the same issue. My boss tells me it’s common for the wire to break but it feels too excessive. Looking around it seems like this wire is rarely used so I am hoping someone here has more knowledge.

That wire is for hardfacing? Probably not very ductile itself..

Have you ever tried using a PTFE/Teflon liner that's normally used for alu welding to see if it helps?

It sounds like the nickel wire is galling inside the normal liner and being 'grabby' on the material. As fluxcore is hollow the wire itself is of course quite weak/fragile so the shock loading from the varying feed speeds as the wire 'grabs' and then goes again (the vibration you notice is likely this effect..) probably makes it fracture on the push point.

I assume the spool(s) you use are too big to otherwise consider using a spool gun?

Otherwise perhaps using a 'push-pull' system with a 'puller' gun may help to get the wire to move smoothly when it does not need to rely on just the roller in the machine pushing it.

Bye, Arno.

Thanks for the response

Yes this is hardfacing wire and very brittle as you described. I haven’t tried using a Teflon liner but I’ll give it a go. The spool is the larger spool, so a spool gun wouldn’t suffice. I know they have 3 different drive rolls. Currently a V notch is installed but I’m thinking changing to a U Notched drive roll. My thought is it wouldn’t pinch the wire thus preventing the breaking.

Thank you

Colby

Do you use a wiper on the wire? I used Lincoln flux core for a long time and could use a 10# roll with very little residue in the wiper ( a folded piece of microfiber washcloth clamped on after the spool). I tried another brand and before long it did the same thing you have happening. Found out the wiper was plugging up with some kind of oily crap, possibly corrosion protection, that had fed thru after the wiper plugged up and was plugging in the tip. Went back to Lincoln wire, problem solved.