Thread: MIG or TIG?

Im no expert in the field, but my bro is. He was telling me the other day about these newish MIGs you can buy that are an inverter type rather than the typical transformer (cant recall the techy words) Anyway, he welds everything, alloy, stainless, mild, etc. Aparently these newer generation MIG's can do both steel and alloy. So going by that I would do the MIG course.

MIG is fairly easy to pick up yourself.

TIG is much better (and neater) than mig for welding thin alloy panels. I have welded LR panels with a MIG successfully, but I have needed to use a brass block as a heatsink behind the area to be welded. With TIG you don't need to do that, and the welds are much neater.

Only downside is that TIG is harder to learn and more time consuming.

Hi Tote;

If the pupose of 'learning' is to learn to weld 'Aluminum' , my suggestion is start off with TIG ( GTAW ) at Local TAFE and see how you go , you start off with 'routine' , then onto 'weld using' and then 'advanced' , most of the retirees I see at evening college are mainly there to learn TIG for sake of welding Aluminum boats or other projects they have lined up around the house , or Tradies wanting to brush up on their Tigging skills , you will enjoy it immensely and it is very rewarding when you can weld alloy and get it to come up nice and shiny after preping your Job . all the best with it mate.

If I was to do a course I'd pick TIG. Migs a piece of ****, as long as you have a good welder, but TIG is an art and one well worth learning if you get the chance IMHO.
Cheers

What type of welder are you going to buy?,mig is a lot more useful than tig. Pat

Originally Posted by Tote

I'm considering enrolling at my local TAFE in a welding coures and am trying to decide between MIG and TIG classes. I'm a reasonably competent weder with either stick or oxy although I've got an oxy set and prefer to use it.
Purpose for learning either class is to fix old Land Rovers ie. aluminium welding
so what do the experts on the forum think....

Regards,
Tote

If you can Oxy weld then you will find TIG to be a walk in the park. If you're working on Al sheet etc like panels etc, then I'd be inclined to think TIG. I think that on panels etc that MIG will be very difficult and the results not nearly as good as TIG. If you can Oxy then the big thing that you will take away from the TIG course is probably going to be the theory behind TIG and this is as important as the process so you understand what does what, why it does it and the modifications you can make to the machine to alter the welds produced and to protect/preserve the tungsten.

MIG will be waaay more beneficial in everything else you do with the Landy and I'd rather be MIGing the steelwork rather than TIG for the sake of speed and economy. There is no need to be producing welds to TIG quality even if you can even TIG better than MIG - which sounds a bit off at this stage.

I have both and I've never used the TIG on any of the Landys. If its Aluminium and broken then I just replace it as its a lot easier.

If it were me, I'd look to do a MIG course.

Also note, that the stick welders that do TIG don't TIG aluminium as they don't have AC current and high frequency.

Definitely TIG. gives you more options down the track.

we've got a nice MIG at home and it does a sterling job! but i still wish it was a TIG for alloy/stainless stuff.

and AFAIK, a TIG can still do mild steel? someone can confirm that

Originally Posted by robzilla

Definitely TIG. gives you more options down the track.

we've got a nice MIG at home and it does a sterling job! but i still wish it was a TIG for alloy/stainless stuff.

and AFAIK, a TIG can still do mild steel? someone can confirm that

TIG will weld anything really.