Welding Tips and Tricks

first post and I'm glad to be here. have already learned a ton from this fine site, it's users and admins.
I'm finding mig around tube to be very hard to do. For practice, I'm butt welding one inch diameter ~.10 wall A36 steel tubes in line. I can't move my hands more than a quarter of the way around that one inch diameter tube.
Even just trying to find a way to go 90 degrees around, my tip to work distance is all over the place. I'm putting down diagonal beads instead of a nice radial ones around the practice tube. Can't find a good place to hold my head. Bead is fat at the ends and skinny in the middle (too slow, too fast, then too slow again). This is sooo hard to do-
I'm starting to hear the violins....
The two approaches I've tried to hold and move the torch are: looking down the length of tube toward the weld and rolling my wrists. Ugly baby. Also tried looking at the side of the tube watching the weld come toward me. Maybe a little better here. As mig is all I have or will have for quite a while, I need to find a way to do this.

Anyway, this is my second day of learning how to mig. Once I can control the tip location and speed (lots of practice from what I've read and seen),I'm going to install a weld in roll bar kit in my jeep- my first welding project. The rollbar tube to be welded is one and a half inch in diameter so, I think it will be a bit easier than the one inch practice pieces.

So much for my story. I do have a question.
Is there is a tried and true way of welding around tube? If so, it would be great to hear about.

The best way i've found to do small tube is to tack weld it together first and then run small beads to connect the tacks. Divide the tube into 1/4's or 1/8ths (it doesn't have to be precise) tack one side, check for straightness, go around to the other side and tack that.Go halfway between the two, tack it again on both sides, divide it again if you want and then connect the dots!

I'm sure there are many other ways to do it, but this has always worked well for me.

Other Steve

When I have the room to do it,

(Example is for right-handed.) I grip the tube lightly with my left hand, between me and the weld, thumb toward me. Gun in right hand, I rest my right wrist on my left, bending the two as needed for a good torch angle. I weld with my wrist and arms "locked", rotating my body around the tube so that my left hand is the pivot point.

Your mileage may vary...

Steve S

Many thanks Gents. With your suggestions, I've gone from a squiggle around the tube to a ring. Still need work but I'm well ahead of where I was as far as having a workable procedure.
Cliff in Palmdale CA

One suggestions I would have for you is to get a bigger piece to practice. Small tube is much harder than bigger tube. Get a piece of three or four inch tube just to get your motion down. The hard.thingabout smaller tubing is that you have constantly be adjusting to maintain torch angle and stick length. Not a good idea to do small tube in small stitches with mig good chance of cold lapping better to do it in one shot if possible.