My first welds...critiques welcome

[dmw16]

I setup my Miller 141 today and laid my first welds (ever). I'm just a hobbyist and am learning this on my own. So I would welcome any feedback.

These are just my first attempts with .030 solid core wire on C25. The first 3 pictures are using autoset and the rest are using the settings recommended on the welder.

Please forgive the mill scale. My son is sleeping and his room is over the garage so I didn't want to fire up the grinder.

 

[Richard Cranium]

practice, practice, practice. some of your welds looks very good some of them are too fast. some did not penetrate well. other one did very well. You might look into welding classes at Maker Space or your local collage. Just keep on burning away. Not many people pick up a stinger and start well. Don't scrimp on personal protection equipment. Good luck

 

[dmw16]

Thanks. I couldn't find any local classes at the college, but we do have a maker space down in VA so I'll look into that.

I bought good (I think) safety gear. Miller digital helmet, gloves, welding jacket, and I've got safety glasses on under the helmet.

I'd agree they aren't consistent. I think the manual set ones look better than the auto set ones. But the material thickness is at the edge of what the 141 can do. So that doesn't help.

I'd say the two aspects I need to work thru are electrode placement and speed.

 

[fury9]

Not to bad for your first ever welds, I would seriously look into class though (from experience) especially if you're going to weld anything structural.

 

[dmw16]

Closest thing I plan to do to structural welding is an exhaust and some tabs to hold a window net on my roll cage. But if I can find classes I'd love to. Just lots of constraints on my time already and the local community college only offers day time classes for people looking to weld professionally.

 

[ovrrdrive]

Not bad at all for first timer... Your beads are nice and straight. I go straight for a bit then start wandering around unless I can see a good reference point. You don't seem to have that problem.

Everyone told me to take a class at the local college too. The only problem with that is the only one they offered was an 18 month class at over $3500. I'm learning on my own.

 

[GTA Matt]

Really not bad for your first go at it. I can definitely tell which ones you first started at and see a good progression. For the most part, they are a little cold/poor penetration/moving to fast. Turning the wire speed down a hair and moving a little slower would probably yield some great looking welds. Play around with the machine, see what works and what doesn't work for you.

 

[slip knot]

The migs make some really pretty welds. pretty isn't always strong tho. Start breaking/bending a few welds and see how they hold up. I started on a stick machine and transitioned to a mig and damn, the mig made some beautiful welds but they break real easy.

 

[Toofast28]

Good welds to start, some look a bit cold, others fast, some slow. Keep working on it, you'll get it figured out.

I've been welding since I was 6. I'll say this, figure out how to set the machine, change settings (heat, feed speed) both ways so you know what is wrong and what/how much change in the setting you need to get it to weld correctly. It'll help you learn. Plus you can weld with anyone's machine once you know how to adjust the settings. Try different metal thicknesses too.

Also the recommended settings that come with the machine are for perfectly clean metal and ideal conditions, flat welding position, etc. so if you have to adjust from them that's normal, very rarely are you going to have perfect metal and perfect conditions.

So, practice, but good start.

 

[dmw16]

Really not bad for your first go at it. I can definitely tell which ones you first started at and see a good progression. For the most part, they are a little cold/poor penetration/moving to fast. Turning the wire speed down a hair and moving a little slower would probably yield some great looking welds. Play around with the machine, see what works and what doesn't work for you.

Thanks. My untrained eye was decently pleased after spending an hour with it. I started with the autoset and they looked a little cold so going to manual mode and giving it a little more heat and a little less wire helped I think. A friend of mine who's a fabricator suggested widening my circles as I make my passes so I'll try that tomorrow (later today now I guess here on the east coast).

The migs make some really pretty welds. pretty isn't always strong tho. Start breaking/bending a few welds and see how they hold up. I started on a stick machine and transitioned to a mig and damn, the mig made some beautiful welds but they break real easy.

I tried standing on/in the V I created between the two pieces of metal and expected them to fail and they held my weight (even after the holidays) just fine. Not scientific but it feel stronger than I expected after so little time playing with it.

This metal is just drop from a local fabrication shop. I bought some smaller stock from home depot tonight that I'll cut into chunks and work on more joints. Something I can toss in a vice and try to break tomorrow. Or throw in my chop saw to examine the weld in cross-section.

I think it will be a fun skill to learn.

 

[AZFairlane]

Check with some of the welding supply stores in your area, they may have classes you can take. I know around here they do.

 

[Toofast28]

Thanks. My untrained eye was decently pleased after spending an hour with it. I started with the autoset and they looked a little cold so going to manual mode and giving it a little more heat and a little less wire helped I think. A friend of mine who's a fabricator suggested widening my circles as I make my passes so I'll try that tomorrow (later today now I guess here on the east coast).







I tried standing on/in the V I created between the two pieces of metal and expected them to fail and they held my weight (even after the holidays) just fine. Not scientific but it feel stronger than I expected after so little time playing with it.



This metal is just drop from a local fabrication shop. I bought some smaller stock from home depot tonight that I'll cut into chunks and work on more joints. Something I can toss in a vice and try to break tomorrow. Or throw in my chop saw to examine the weld in cross-section.



I think it will be a fun skill to learn.

Go back to the local fab shop and explain what you're doing and ask if you can purchase some drops or scraps to practice with, it'll be A LOT cheaper than buying stuff at Home Depot. You may get lucky and they'll give it to you free... But your money will go a lot further there than Home Depot regardless. Home Depot prices are about 20x what cost is on steel.

 

[dmw16]

My first set of practice pieces were drop that they sold to me for a few bucks. But I wanted some specific sizes and Home Depot is open on Saturday and it's easy. The fab shop that sells metal opens after I leave for work and closes before I'm home, so it's a special trip.

 

[dmw16]

Check with some of the welding supply stores in your area, they may have classes you can take. I know around here they do.

Next trip over there I will. The guy at Roberts Oxygen was kinda standoffish when I was telling him I was doing it for the first time and didn't really seem to give a ****, so I took my c25 tank and left.

 

[bullnerd]

Go here and watch as much mig videos as you can handle. It really helps to see someone else do it. Plus he has great tips on setup and arc length. Just an all around great guy and site. Get on his video list so you don't miss any.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...wP-Cnc2H1ZQtFkeKXkQbng&bvm=bv.110151844,d.eWE

 

[dmw16]

Go here and watch as much mig videos as you can handle. It really helps to see someone else do it. Plus he has great tips on setup and arc length. Just an all around great guy and site. Get on his video list so you don't miss any.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...wP-Cnc2H1ZQtFkeKXkQbng&bvm=bv.110151844,d.eWE

Thanks. I watched his mig intro videos while we were away for the holidays. I am going to lay more beads today and try different settings and take notes and then watch more of his stuff and rewatch some of it. After the first watch I need some hands on context.

 

[TheEquineFencer]

Not bad at all for first timer... Your beads are nice and straight. I go straight for a bit then start wandering around unless I can see a good reference point. You don't seem to have that problem.

Everyone told me to take a class at the local college too. The only problem with that is the only one they offered was an 18 month class at over $3500. I'm learning on my own.

LOL, as a past "career student" inquire about auditing the classes, taking it without being graded on it. Then you can pretty much go when you want to. I used to take a machine shop class at a community college so I could use the equipment. I worked it out with the instructor so I didn't upset his classes. The only "problem" my buddy and I ran into was, the instructor starting requesting us to get there either on time at the start or at the time when they took a break. The reason was the students would wait for us to get there to see what we were bringing to class to work on. We were doing everything from cutting cylinder heads open to see how much we could modify stock ones without hitting a water jacket, to building a jig for/and narrowing Ford rear ends. I also took a few years of auditing Diesel Mechanics classes so we could use the QuickWay head shop and machines for rebuilding cylinder heads.

 

[motofool33]

LOL, as a past "career student" inquire about auditing the classes, taking it without being graded on it. Then you can pretty much go when you want to. I used to take a machine shop class at a community college so I could use the equipment. I worked it out with the instructor so I didn't upset his classes. The only "problem" my buddy and I ran into was, the instructor starting requesting us to get there either on time at the start or at the time when they took a break. The reason was the students would wait for us to get there to see what we were bringing to class to work on. We were doing everything from cutting cylinder heads open to see how much we could modify stock ones without hitting a water jacket, to building a jig for/and narrowing Ford rear ends. I also took a few years of auditing Diesel Mechanics classes so we could use the QuickWay head shop and machines for rebuilding cylinder heads.

cool idea

 

[dmw16]

Some welds from day 2. Had a ton of trouble getting the mill scale off. Even a 36 grit wheel didn't really do a great job. So gonna need to do some more research on how to handle that.

1/8" is where the welder taps out on solid .030" wire. So the welds are a little cold. I also need to work on starting and stopping. I think I'm not starting with enough stickout and also need to pause there a little as I start because the starts look extra cold.

First 3 pics are trying different wire feed speeds on a manual setting. Power is at max.

Pic 4 is suggested settings 10/75 (power/wire speed).

Pic 5 is auto set.

Pic 6 is auto set with my pushing left to right.

Still lots of practice to get, but I'm fairly happy with what I've accomplished so far.

I've hit a bunch of these with a big hammer and nothing breaks. So I think that's a decent sign.

I am going to order some .024 wire and try some thinner metal just to work with something where I can adjust the heat up and down to experiment a little.

 

[jimgood]

I really love these abrasive discs for removing mill scale. They're on sale right now so it's a good time to grab a bunch (I already had 10 on hand and ordered 10 more when I saw they were on sale).

I use them in my 4 1/2" angle grinder. The mill scale's toughness can vary on different pieces of metal and from various manufacturers. If I had to guess, I'd say it takes me 6 - 12 seconds per foot, depending on the toughness of the scale.

http://www.lehighvalleyabrasives.co...d-t27-clean-strip-disc-black-coarse-cs4-5-crs

 

[dmw16]

Thanks. I'll give those a try. I used something similar to clean up a concrete subfloor...may still have one or two laying around. I hadn't thought to try them.

 

[Premium08]

Next trip over there I will. The guy at Roberts Oxygen was kinda standoffish when I was telling him I was doing it for the first time and didn't really seem to give a ****, so I took my c25 tank and left.

Roberts Oxygen in Petersburg?

 

[dmw16]

Roberts Oxygen in Petersburg?

No, their location in Frederick, MD.

 

[ovrrdrive]

Some welds from day 2. Had a ton of trouble getting the mill scale off. Even a 36 grit wheel didn't really do a great job. So gonna need to do some more research on how to handle that.

Good reading...

http://weldingweb.com/showthread.php?76301-Millscale