Welding Tips and Tricks

I am having some fun tig welding the roll cage in my mustang. I have an old miller 330a/bp that doesnt have a remote amp control. The welding shop says its impossible to make one work. I welded up a metal frame to hold the pedal and used a power window regulator from a car to make my own remote amp control. I power it with an old makita flash light that was broken so its rechargeable. It looks pretty silly and my friends laugh at it but it works. Trying to position the pedal in the car with me was annoying. I never was good at twister lol.

Let 'em laugh.

It's hard to argue with results!

That's awesome who cares what it looks, as long as it works. Ya it sucks doing a roll cage in the with a foot pedal. A torch mounted control works a lot better even they feel really weird if aren't used to it.

I might try to put a pic of it on here. I also thought of using a wiper motor set up from a car to do pulse tig ( just kidding ).

mikewalker11 wrote:I might try to put a pic of it on here. I also thought of using a wiper motor set up from a car to do pulse tig ( just kidding ).

You might be kidding, and a wiper motor isn't practical,

but I've put some thought into an electro-mechanical solution for consistent pulsing on older machines. I don't have anything tangible, yet, but the idea is sound in theory.

Realistically, a digital circuit based on a 555 timer is the better solution, but some folk are just more comfortable building mechanical things.

I dont have a ton of knowledge of electronics. Im mechanic at a dealership. I just used what i had. Sounds like you could invent some cool stuff.

I'm sure I'd be "re-inventing" it. I've seen it discussed before. I just got a smile from the wiper-motor concept. It's remarkably close to the simpler electro-mechanical ideas out there.

I've used power window drives creatively before. I gave a friend's T-bucket an electric trunk-lift with one, augmented with pneumatic lift cylinders, so he could expose his speakers from the drivers' seat with a button.

I'm not a pro welder either. My Dad had an arc welder in the garage and let me use it. I just bought this tig welder 2 years ago. I watched a few videos and destroyed some aluminum lol. This thing diddnt have a post flow timer when I got it. I didnt know it needed one. It has one now and my tungsten and welds look a ton better.