critique needed

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hobart handler 125settings of "4" (max voltage) and 20-30 wire speed (30 was suggested by chart).030" wirethe square tube is 1x1 with 1/16 wall thickness mild steel.  the tube I am trying to weld to is 2x2 1/8 wall thickness mild steel.the welder is set up with the MIG conversion, wired correctly, and I am using C25 gas.  my flow is about 25 at rest so when I pull the trigger it drops and delivers 13-17.the problem I am seeing is twofold - one is an unusual amount of brown dust.  two is the weld quality.  it just seems to "stand up" and not penetrate.  it seems to rather than create a puddle that I can push a bit it creates a sphere on the end of the wire on the gun.  I normally weld extremely close (so close that the shield tip hits the work piece sometimes and pops the breaker...) and with these same settings.  I don't think it's a welder issue because I've had success with this before.I was welding yesterday on thinner metal (18 gauge floorpans).  after having success on these floorpans earlier, I was really struggling and getting this glowing sphere on the end of my wire rather than wanting to stick to the work piece.  I normally weld that really quickly on "2" and "20" so I tried more wire speed, less wire speed, more and less voltage.  Nothing worked, so I figured it was contamination (painted floorpans).  I was too lazy to strip them where as the others I had stripped.  So I went back today and stripped them and seemed to go much more successfully.But I should not be having these problems with the tubes I am adding as they are bare.  Further, off the car, I was able to weld this exact tube to a piece of 1/8" plate with no issues.  That's the last picture, that same exact tube welded not ten minutes before.  A lot less brown dust, awesome penetration (for me), and decent looking, fast moving welds.One note is when in the car I am welding upward versus off the car I am welding downward.  But I have about 12 hours of welding into this car already without this issue of working upside down (lying on my back facing up).Any input?I have about 100 hours experience welding ARC and MIG, only with this unit, with no formal training whatsoever.  I am signed up for an adult education class in two weeks.could it be a bad ground?
Reply:The “Brown Dust” looks like slag from flux core wire. What is the number on the spool, ER70S-6 or E71T-11?
Reply:er70s-6 is all I have ever used.  I recently put a new gun liner in it but it seemed to work even better and switched to a 10lb spool.  the third pic is the first welding I did with the new setup and it seemed to work as good or better than before.I agree when I used to arc and use .35 and .30 flux core it all looked like that.
Reply:Originally Posted by 95PGTTecher70s-6 is all I have ever used.  I recently put a new gun liner in it but it seemed to work even better and switched to a 10lb spool.  the third pic is the first welding I did with the new setup and it seemed to work as good or better than before.I agree when I used to arc and use .35 and .30 flux core it all looked like that.
Reply:Just so you know mig can not weld through crude, gunk or what ever else you want to call it.  Also mig can not weld through mill scale either no matter what anyone says, so all metal should be ground clean.  Stick out is very important with mig so you need to keep the tip a consistent distance away from your work like 3/8" because that messing with that distance is like someone playing with your settings.  Recommend setting for .030 wire is 4 on heat and 25 on wire speed and for .023 its 4 on heat and 80 on wire speed.  I would try running .023 wire because it will allow to fine tune your wire speed more accurately.  Your welds do look like you have to much wire speed.
Reply:so this square tube stock that I bought from the metal supplier needs to be ground also?  like with the sanding disk or with wire wheel?that sucks...I was using .023 before but it goes through wire QUICK.  I have now gone through one 2lb roll of .030 and it lasted a ton longer and with my same hand speed seemed to make a deeper penetrating and wider weld but it burns through the thinner stuff much easier.  is this normal?  I dont remember the brand off hand, sorry.  nevermind, found some pictures, it's Blue Demon.  I also have in the past used whatever GTS-Welco sells with success.What I really don't understand is the third picture is literally ten minutes prior to on the same exact piece of metal under the same exact conditions.  No coatings, no changes to gas, wire, speed, voltage, hand movement, distance, angle, direction, anything.  The ONLY differences are where the ground clamp was located and the fact that I was lying on my back and now I was joining the square tube to square tube instead of square tube to flat stock plate.  I don't get what changed?
Reply:Alright young man, well which wire worked better for you the .023 or .030? Relocating your ground can have an effect on your machine if the new location is not ideal (clean).  Sand or grind all your metal, some contamination can come from the inside of the tube.  Whats your location?
Reply:Originally Posted by 95PGTTechso this square tube stock that I bought from the metal supplier needs to be ground also?  like with the sanding disk or with wire wheel?that sucks...
Reply:1. Clean metal with grinder/sander like was said. Most metal comes with a coating to keep it from rusting. Remove from weld area.2. Play with both .030 and .023 to get a feel of each but I have found on these machines they simply do better with .023. Yea, they go through wire faster but the welders just seem to struggle with .030.3. If your are using the non-flux core wire with the correct gas mix, the brown area will be from either lack of gas or contaminants (non-clean metal)4. I weld a lot of thin metal but what I do doesn't match he chart. For something like that I would probably weld on power setting 3 with 70-75 as a starting point for speed. More heat will require more speed. If it gets moltant, increase the speed. If it starts to spit and spat, slow it down. 5. Higher heat on thinner metal you will need to space your welds out. Weld little here, weld a little there, let it cool. Keep it from warping.
Reply:Thanks guys, I will try a few things today and repost.1.  Go back to welding off car and see if it changes again.  I did just put in the gun liner so maybe I kinked the hose somewhere.2.  Clean the metal better.3.  Clean my ground and move it closer.4.  If nothing else, I'll go back to the .023 wire.  I'd prefer not to and have a useless ~45LB of wire sitting around, as the .030 was working good up to this point, but I need to get this working right again, these are important welds that I'd prefer not to be re-doing.
Reply:Thank you everyone for your contributions.I am located in Levittown, PA and work on my car in Princeton, NJ.I would be willing to travel with myself and equipment for those more experienced than myself to show me a trick or fifteen billion.Long story short, whoever it was who mentioned wire speed hit it on the head.  After another hour of frustration this morning I did the only thing I hadn't done yet and turn the wire speed up.  I figured when welding thicker materials, I would want more heat with less wire so that heat is applied hotter and longer to that less wire.  I guess that's not the case.  I got better results at 40 and started cranking it 45, 50, 55, 60, 65 and kept getting better I kept it up until it started spattering really bad then found a happy ground.Is 15-20 an appropriate flow rate for C25 for what I am doing?  That is trigger depressed.  "Off the throttle" it sits about 25-30.I picked up a thing of tip-gel or whatever it's called.  It works pretty good but I don't know how to apply it.  If I get even the littlest bit on the wire it really bounces around until it torches it off.  Remove tip shield, dip it in gel, return to welder perhaps?The other wire I could not remember is HyperGlide.Some follow up pics from today:
Reply:The purpose of that was to demonstrate what settings and how using them off the car on that uncleaned 1/8 plate worked pretty good for my skills at least.This is that ball-up effect.  Often it glows red hot embers that drop into the shield tip and freak out the gas flow and then drop on me below and are really hot.  Generally they just ball up like this and do not stick to material.Someone on another forum also suggested making sure I have my last few feet of the power/gas/gun really straight to give good gas flow and no kinks so I tried that.Onto the car back to poor results.  No changes in settings.  Cleaned it up as described.
Reply:It got better only when I significantly upped the wire speed just by guess and check.  Welds on the car improved to what I previously deemed OK.So for a final critique this is what I am okay with what does everyone think?  To the left is the factory pinch weld welded together (look to right, see those 3 thin pieces...two 18 gauge and one a bit thicker...welding that together at the end).  going straight up and down and then L to right is 1/16 tube to car 18 gauge.  far to right is 1/16 tube to 1/8 plate (intentionally not to car yet, I have to bang that pinch weld closer).  are these acceptable?  I know they're ugly.Also the brown watery sludge in the weld like in the first picture of post 8 which I think to be my best weld of the set.  That is contamination correct?  How do I better eliminate this?  I am welding a lot on a car with 110,000 miles it has the factory sound deadener and seam sealer and paint and some rust.  I do the best I can with a stiff wire wheel on a electric grinder and sometimes a flap disk sander.  Then aircraft grade stripper, scraper, wire brush.  Wire wheel again.  Scratch awl for seams like this pictured below then a small pick.  There is still a bit in there after all this.  And the welder does not seem to like the residue left behind by the stripper very spattery until it burns it off.  I would normally use brake cleaner but I heard this and MIG is bad for cancer.  Any good cleaners that are cost effective or better tools or methods of stripping to bare metal better and quicker?