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Say for welding from .5 up to 2mm ally sheet, what would you reccomend?Quote:
Originally Posted by rick130
What are inverter DC TIG,s good for?
What about thishttp://www.ebay.com.au/itm/NEW-ROSSI-Welder-Inverter-Plasma-Cutter-4in1-Welding-Machine-AC-DC-TIG-ARC-Stick-/160861426342?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_15&hash=item25741 692a6
Keith
I have been doing some reading.
Perhaps this would be better.
Boswell 200Amp AC DC Inverter TIG ARC Aluminum Welder | eBay
K
Hi Keith, I'm not a welders backside, but have been lucky to work with a couple of brilliant welders over the years. :D
I can braze till the cows come home, and am passable at oxy welding, if I've been practicing but I've mostly had access to brilliant welders, the type of blokes that make those incredibly neat, even TIG beads that look more like art than an industrial process of joining metals.
DC TIG's are great for steel and particularly stainless, especially if it has an adjustable pulse setting.
Yes, I am just a farm welder using stick and gas fusion.
Reading up on TIG as I would like one for thin ally and it seems you need AC for it cleans up the ally as it goes. Not so much need for the SS wire brush.
That last I linked to seems OK and I was just asking for comments.
Not meaning to hijack the thread but the discussion I hope will help the OP.
K
sikaflex.....if you're just bonding ally sheet to a frame a nice clean joint and a bead of that stuff with good clamping while it cures...Quote:
Originally Posted by 123rover50
Im keen to give some of these a try. Not on a roof rack maybe unless it had lots of bracing.
[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqkceLrH9Ao[/ame]
[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJ42scaWFnw[/ame]
Dave
As that second vid says, it's actually hard brazing, not welding.
I've brazed aluminium, you need the right flux and the heat is directed by capillary action, if the flame hits the flux it oxidises and it's game over.
You can fusing weld aluminium with an oxy/acetylene blowpipe, I've seen it done and it looked just like a MIG bead, again you need special flux and picking the puddle before it collapses is an art.
Ideally you use a special lens in your welding goggles too, again so you can pick the puddle before it all goes ta ta's.
Yes I use Sikaflex like that a lot, but I was meaning edge to edge.
Woops, I should have quoted Blknight.
Its in reply to his post.
The reason you need to use AC for welding aluminium is that the aluminium oxide melts at a much higher temperature than aluminium metal.
The AC pulsing/swinging from +ve to -ve burns the aluminium oxide from the surface of the metal allowing it to be melted cleanly and at a far lower temperature than if the oxide remained on the surface. This works even better with an argon shield which prevents the molten metal re-oxidising whilst welding.
That is why TIG or MIG are the preferred methods for welding aluminium.
Arc welding rods need to their flux to prevent oxidisation of the molten metal.
As mentioned previously by Rick, it is possible, but difficult, to oxy acetylene weld certain types of aluminium if you clean off the aluminium oxide, flux and then immediately weld it (usually cheap grades of alloys as you would find in teapots etc).
Certain series aluminium alloys are more weld-able than others. From memory all of the 1000 and most of the 4000, 5000, 6000 and some of the 7000 series alloys are readily weld-able.
Always use a stainless steel wire brush to clean your material when welding aluminium.
Hope this helps :)
I bought some of these rods and gave them a go. No way I would use them for anything structural like a roof rack but I did manage to get a good join with it properly brushed clean and the right temperature (quite hot and clean).Quote:
Originally Posted by SouthOz
Freshly joined:
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...015/07/240.jpg
But this came apart with a bit of force from a hammer.
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...015/07/241.jpg
I did it again but went for a bit more heat and more liberal application of rod and took to it with the hammer more and more...
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...015/07/242.jpg
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...015/07/243.jpg
https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/im...015/07/244.jpg
I couldn't hit the lump any harder without knocking it out of the vice, but the join was still good. So that was solid, I couldn't break it. Difficult to tell from looking at it whether you had a good join though. My better "looking" join was the weaker one. If you spent some more time on it you could probably repeat some good joins. I still wouldn't trust it for anything serious, but there is definitely some cases it would be OK.
I was using MAPP gas but propane would be fine I think.