Georgia Trail Riders Forum
MEMBERS DISCUSSION AREA => General Discussion => Topic started by: kvom on December 19, 2012, 05:15:51 PM
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Question:
The last couple of days I did a lot of Mig welding of 1" square thick-wall steel tubes. My welder is a Lincoln 175, and had the heat at max. .023" wire.
At the end of each weld I almost always end up with a small glowing glob of melt at the end of the wire. Does this mean I'm doing something wrong? I've been cutting this off between welds, which slows things down a lot.
Thoughts?
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.023 wire with a 175? Sounds like you should .035 wire.
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yeah should be runnin .035 i wouldnt worrie about the lil glob on the end of the wire
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You don't have to cut the ball off the end. But if you don't it will leave a shot pieces of wire some times. If you can pull more amps with your 175 (220amp plug in) I would go to the .035. If you have a lot of welding It would be much faster to run a weld with too. Turn you amps up as high as you can hold a bead with.
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Do a test run with an extra hand an listen to the weld I set mine by sound, play with the heat and wire speed till it sounds like its a quick burning camp fire( a little popping, mine is affected by wire speed as much as it is by heat) and you should be close, also go to a .030 or .035 wire. If none of that works I can probably swing by your place Friday and give you a hand for a bit.
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I did get the job done mostly done, just looking for advice on better technique. The .025 wire I'm using came with the welder. When I bought the welder 6 years ago and the tank of gas, I figured both were a lifetime supply. I've used over half the wire now, but mainly in little fixup jobs here and there. This current job, the first "big" welding project, is a rolling stand for my model steam locomotive.
(http://www.pbase.com/kvom/image/147939082/large.jpg)
I'm one piece of tube short for the other rail.
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Looks good </ROCKIN/>