Hey lads i am about to buy a welder soon in a few weeks i hope.
So what style of welding should i learn?
I have read a lot of articles and watched heaps of videos and i am leaning towards MIG welding?
TIG welding seems useful for smaller welds? I would like to learn how to weld on alloy and steel?
I will buy the welder first and have a play then do a short course on welding they have 1 and 2 day courses run by artist here. I cant find many more courses i might try and see if i can hang around a fabrication shop and learn. Any one out there i will work for free and probably burn your shop down
I guess most important info is what will i be welding? Well any thing i guess probably make chairs and shelves finally make the damn BBQ from the keg lol. No structural welding at the start lol
In my head it seems like a really useful skill its some thing i can apply to most areas. I can basically make my own any thing out of steel.
I know BLF is full of people from all walks of life so some one may be able to sway me either way. I am all ears my best mate is mechanic but he cant really weld so he wasn’t much help. If i was going to go tight i would just go and buy cheapo gear. I figured i am keen so i will buy tools that last so i am willing to put more into my budget.
I haven't Mig'd or Tig'd, but I think you are on the right track. I have a couple Arc welders and can say they are pretty hard to master (I haven't yet). That is because the arc actually dies each time the pulse switches from positive to negative (60Hz). So keeping an arc alive is hard and doing light materials is very hard to not burn through as you learn. I am building a rectifier so I can DC arc weld. That is supposed to be much easier. AC really is only needed in a couple situations like magnetized metals and corners (I think).
I have gas welders and that is much easier. I think if I every do invest in another welder, I will go Mig. Looking forward to hearing what some knowledgeable folks post here in your thread.
Battery tab welding! It only requires a ~$120USD spot welder from eBay and some Nickel tab material. You could build/rebuild battery packs. Now THAT is a useful skill/trade for the electronics obsessed world we now live in. I have several tools that need new battery packs right now. I’ve already bought everything I need for one battery pack, but haven’t done anything with it because I’m afraid that solder won’t be a physically strong enough connection for the rough use these tools see.
I’m a total amateur home hobbiest welder with my small 120V Hobart MIG, so take my comments with a grain of salt…
If you have the budget and really want to become a good welder, invest in TIG. With a TIG you will be able to weld stainless and aluminum in addition to mild steel, and by necessity you will have to learn to become a decent welder.
Learning to weld on a MIG is easy, but can be a double-edge sword because it it relatively so easy to stick to peices of metal together. The ease of “pull trigger, weld done” can be a crutch unless you really try to understand what is happening and how to make good welds. And your MIG welds won’t ever be as pretty as a good TIG weld, if that matters to you.
My first welding experience (how I learned) was TIG, on thinwall stainless. That said, I have a 120V Hobart MIG in my garage because it is the right tool for my budget and homeowner-DIY needs. A lot of people bash on the 120V welders and claim they are underpowered and you are doing yourself a disservice and won’t be able to make a decent weld if you don’t buy the big 240V Millers that cost $2k. (:eyeroll:)
I think that’s crap. Well, maybe that’s true for the Harbor Freight 120V units, but a Lincoln, Miller, or Hobart (made by Miller) are great for their intended purpose. No they won’t weld 1/4” steel plate in one pass, but how often are you welding that type of stuff? On the rare occasion you might need to, just do more than one pass. And the portability of the 120V unit is a big deal for me - it is easy to grab the welder and take it out to the backyard, or to my father-in-law’s house for any random repair job. You can’t do that with a 200lb machine that needs 240V.
I’m no expert, but I’d say MIG. It’s pretty easy to get the hang of and very useful.
I watched my dad weld (stick, MIG, TIG, etc… he welded for a living) for years and then took a course at a community college just for good measure. The course was very helpful - they provided all the equipment and materials, instruction, challenges, etc.
I’m thinking about taking a welding course this year.
Never had to weld because my neighbor was a welder /blacksmith by trade.
Now that he has passed on I’m on my own……
So I would say to find a place to take a Welding Course which should help you figure out what direction to take.
I have no idea about the brands available to you in Australia. But do avoid the cheap ones such as the ones harbor Freight sells us in the USA. Here I would not buy anything other than a Hobart, a Miller or a Lincoln. In the land of OZ it’s all 240 volt so he has no need to worry about that argument.
I am not an expert on the tech details of all welders. However my Lincoln MIG (180 amp output) welds on DC. I’m not certain if all MIG weld on DC. Most likely I think.
You can weld stainless steel with a MIG, but need different gas and of course different weld wire. And some more practice. Aluminum needs a spool gun and again a different gas. Aluminum is much more difficult.
MIG is lousy if you have to weld outdoors as winds will blow the shielding gas away.
I’ve welded since 1982. Learn how to stick weld and braze weld with oxy acetalin and the rest , mig, tig etc you’ll pick up fast, but you should start with the basics first
No, flux core is just as strong and can even have better side wall penetration (I think that is the term) and higher deposition rates (speed is likely not an issue for people not using it in a production setting). Flux core will be better in outdoor applications, especially if it is windy, because the sheilding gas greated by the burning flux will not be blown away from the workpiece. Yes, flux core leaves more spatter.
Practice practice practice. Take a few more classes and practice more.
Buy a grinder as well to clean up things. Nothing worse that a sloppy weld and spatter everywhere.
Practice more.
I do not have near the practice that I feel comfortable working on cars, but I see people welding that have questionable skills and even worse welds taking those same cars on the road.
Remember that people will look at your work and assume that because it is welded that it is permanent and never going to break.
I have no idea if what you were looking at was worth the extra. I was thinking along the lines of something like this.
Keep in mind that most dont weld aluminium. Duty cycle may be on your list of things to keep an eye on as well if your doing a fair amount of welding at once.
The other thing is you can turn a high amp welder down lower but you cant turn a low current welder past its maximum.
Good luck on the search and research.
It has been a number of years since I did much welding , but I think my memory is still good enough to offer at least a little advice.
As has already been stated the type of welding you do and the thickness of material will dictate what type of welder you need and how much current / amperage you need. The Mig using the same machine , can use both flux core wire or gas shielded wire with some simple and pretty quick swaps of the tips and head assembly.
The amount of penetration you get into the metal is where a lot of the strength comes from , so the small 120v Mig welders are good for stuff 3/16 and less , thicker than that you really need the bigger welder.
If you don’t get the penetration it is kind of like putting a screw only a few millimeters into a piece of wood instead of an inch or more , it will hold in most cases , but when you get a lot of stress or twisting there is not much there to hold on to , no matter how many passes you make , as the weld is basically sitting on top of the metal.
For old , rusty or dirty metal the Stick or Mig flux core is best for those jobs as they penetrate a little better than the gas and wire Mig setup does and I found the Mig flux core actually seems to do better than the stick welders with dirty or rusty metals many times.
The cleaner the metal you are welding the easier it is pretty much 100% of the time.
There is no one welder that can do ALL metals that I am aware of , that is where the Tig or Heliarc comes in.
Do be aware the Tig is a much more complex learning curve and takes a lot of practice to get good at it.
The Tig are also much more expensive to get a good setup starting out. I say this because if you get everything right you will have the water cooling setup as these machines run really hot. If you are going to be welding heavy stuff you will need like at least a 30 to 40% duty cycle power unit. (170 amps or more) You will also need the electrodes for different metals as there are many types of electrodes that must be used for certain metals , or you will not get a weld to stick at all. They also have the adapter kits to set them up for Tig sticks to weld with the same machine if stick welding is needed or desired.
With the Tig it is almost an absolute must that aluminum is totally clean before welding on it to get an optimum weld. The Tig will give you better control once you learn how to use them and you can weld stuff that is really thin much better without burning through , because you can adjust the current as you weld with the foot control.
The Tig is also a “cleaner” weld as they do not have hardly any spatter to them when used correctly. Also the Tig can use both AC and DC current , provided you get a unit that has the switchable power on it. The AC is used for aluminum , magnesium and such , where the DC is used for stainless , mild steel , cast and other alloy metals.
