lkailburn

wow thanks for all the replies guys! i posted this on turboD and only had 1 so far hehe.

ok lemme reply to some of the comments:

its not mig welding so rather than slowing down the feed rate i need to just dab less with the filler.

yes its tig welding and yes this is the worst tig welding i've done. but again, this is my first attempt at anything besies a flat plate of metal. i kick myself for not practicing more before attempting this but come one, i was so tempted to try out the HF bandsaw

i always grind my tungsten in parallel, never perpendicular.

i definitely agree, welding with nasty dirty metal is pretty useless, i just wanted to give it a go on some scrap to see what would come out. i hope that a lot of the sporadic behavior i was seeing is caused by the dirty metal.

thanks for the replies. i'll practice some more

-Luke

cua0

grab some more scrap and spend a few minutes cleaning it up before you try welding it, it might cure your problem.

lkailburn

*UPDATE

i think you guys are right, cleanliness is my biggest problem. second to that is just plain practice.

i wirebrushed the collector and tried finishing it up to see what could be done and noticably better! arc did not wander from pipe to pipe, stayed very stable in the center.

so i went back over it and tried to finish it. i'm pleased with the final result as a first attempt at ANYTHING besides plate steel






final verdict-looks like i need a touch more heat or go just a tad slower to even out that penetration and just get a bit more practice with torch control over shapes.

i'll get some clean 1.5" mild to make a second attempt just for practice.

-Luke

darksol2005

First off, practice welding more. Your not going to be able to do ---- with horrible welds like that. Then, after you can lay down a decent bead, clean the metal better, and for your problem w/ the top of the collector, leave more length at the top

lkailburn

well practice makes perfect. and makeing good beads on flate plate doesn't help me weld collectors so thats why i had to give it a first try

comments taken! thanks

-Luke

Darkelvis

turn up the heat a little and on your root pass don't use any filler, then do a pretty pass on top with filler.

lkailburn

hm thanks i might try that just on some scrap pipe. bevel the edges or leave em as is?

-Luke

jinxy

thats like 16g steel, there's nothing to bevel really.

Darkelvis

a little bevel never hurt anything.

cua0

if you're doing a fusion pass as your first pass you don't want to bevel it.