AR Steel plate for welding table top?

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I know a guy that has a 4'x4'x1/2" thick Steel AR plate that he is willing to give me. The question I have is will this be good for a welding table top. I was going to cut it down a bit to make it a little more manageable in my garage but I don't know if AR steel is welder friendly or not. Will I be able to weld legs and a frame on it without a problem with a 180 amp Lincoln Mig welder.
Reply:The guy is gonna GIVE it to you, and you haven't sped over there to pick it up yet?Miller EconotigCutmaster 38Yes ma'am, that IS a screwdriver in my pocket!
Reply:AR is tool steel..Will be a good table top..Have fun cutting it!...zap!I am not completely insane..Some parts are missing Professional Driver on a closed course....Do not attempt.Just because I'm a  dumbass don't mean that you can be too.So DON'T try any of this **** l do at home.
Reply:If it is free it is for me. I cut AR-400 all day long with Oxy/MAPP and a #4 tip. It will last longer than you and most of your tools as a table.Disclaimer; "I am just an a$$hole welder, don't take it personally ."
Reply:AR will pickup magnetisem. I made a table out of AR 400 and when I use it as a welding table have to use a sheet of aluminuim on top so the magnetisem doesnt affect the arc. there are a couple spots where its hard to pick up the tools from.Last edited by lars66; 09-18-2007 at 07:09 PM.
Reply:I was tired of my table being untrue so I used a 4 x 8 x 3/8" AR plate that had been sitting on the rack for years, shimmed and welded to my table top as a temporary fix.  I planned on cutting it off if it was needed for a project.. That was 4 years ago.   I havn't had any problems with magnetisem.  That table has to have the toughest surface of any table I have used.  When I win the lotto, I will make all surfaces out of AR.Common sense in an uncommon degree is what the world calls wisdom.
Reply:If you don't want it I do! Seriously, go get it before he changes his mind and then decide what to do with it.HH 187Miller Bluestar1EAHP AlphaTig 200X
Reply:if he is giving it to you , better grab it before he looks at what that stuff costs now, I have made a couple of work benches from it and its good stuff, if your going to drill it , drill holes before you go near it with any heat , and if its been out in the weather for a long time scrap the idea of drilling holes , I also built a bench out of some t-5 -5/16 very good as well but harder to work with being it was used and weather hardened, plasma cutter works great on any of it , very little warp if any. and if you get magnetism move ground lead to different areas (arc blow just happens)
Reply:We use AR plate quite often at my work, although recently we have gone to QT plate for the same applications. It is available in 100, 200 and 400 with the hardness increasing with the number. 100 can be punched and sheared, but I wouldn't try it on the other numbers.AR is a bitch to form...after working with it for awhile, Mild steel seems like butter. When rolling it...It'll be coming out of the rolls at about a 45 dergree angle to where it's going in and still straight as an arrow. When bumping it in the brake it tends to flatten out in the ares just adjacent to where you are working.In all honesty, for the purpose of a table top, I can see no advantage over mild steel, but if your getting it for free, by all means use it
Reply:AR is not a tool steel, its a different alloy class of its own. AR stands quite  simply for Abrasion Resistant, and while similar to T and QT series of plates, it will yield quite different results depending on the application. It, to the best of my knowledge (and I use it a LOT), is not significantly more prone magnetism than any other standard alloy steel, and it will make a good tabletop. The nice thing about an AR tabletop is that you can get by with a thinner piece to still have good results. You would never think of building a decent table of 1/4" A36, but you could do it with AR400 so long at you supported it decently well and it would be similar in resilience to a 5/8" piece of A36. You should have no problem welding it with your mig, just max it out and burn it on and multipass if you see the need. IF you get a hairline crack after your first pass. you will have to stop, grind out the weld, and give it some preheat, about 200*F for that thickness of AR plate should do (depending on its value). Hey Tinbasher, is that the cheaper QT100 plate that's coming over here from China that you guys are using? If so how is it working out? I tried some of it for a few months and was having quality issues, so I have gone back to T series stuff from Oregon Steel Mills. They always seem to have good secs on what they produce. The good thing about that imported QT is that it makes more work for me when shops like Accurate Fab are using it and it wears out quick. Somebody has got to come along behind and fix the mess Last edited by Coalsmoke; 09-22-2007 at 01:14 PM.Owner of Bushwacker Mobile WeldingPictures
Reply:Yes Use It!!!!Free = Good!Me!
Reply:Hey coalsmoke...I'm not sure where it's coming from...I never see that end of it..I am pretty sure that it is supplied by Wilkinson, but as to it's origins I'm not sure. We most commonly use the 100, but more and more customers are requesting Trimay plate with the chromium carbide overlay for the high wear applications. Expensive as hell, reeks havoc on the equipment and destroys tooling, toxic to weld, and never wears out. Might be good from the customers perspective, but from a tradesmans perspective...I hate the stuff.
Reply:I had a Trimay rep come out a few months back and drop off a sample of that chromium carbide overlay, neat stuff, but like you say the high price scares some of my customers away from it. I was surprised to hear him say that it can be formed to a relatively tight radius, I guess that's one of the advantages of using an overlay. However, he neglected to tell me that its toxic to weld. I wish he would have filled me in on that.  How toxic are we talking? Is a basic chemical respirator sufficient, or is a separate air source recommended.Owner of Bushwacker Mobile WeldingPictures
Reply:We typically use 3/8" and 1/2", if you have a piece of it, you'll note that on the chromium side there are longitudinal lines running at every inch and a half or so. Those are the boundaries between the weld passes during the manufacture process. So, this stuff has a definite grain and you can only form it in one direction. you have to form it perpendicular to those lines otherwise it'll crack and break apart. If you require the wear surface on the outside radius...it doesn't go well at all. All the wear surface opens up with cracks and you have to spend mega hours filling them up with hardsurfacing. Typically the wear surface is on the inside and as you form it, because the chromium is so hard, it will not compress in the least and what happens is the mild steel back has to stretch considerably in order to allow the bend to occur. You have to bring it up very slow and evenly and it can be massaged down to about a 10 inch diameter, but that would be in relatively short strips, up to about a foot. For anything wider I'd say 16-20 inch diameter is about the minimum. It's a real dicy procedure...it pings, and snaps and cracks and makes all sorts of protests as you work it...and if you push it too far it will fly apart. You also have to fashion a cheap consumable upper die for the brake...typically a roundbar welded to the edge of a heavy flatbarI would never attempt to roll it...it's too inconsistent....we always bump it in the brake. You'd destroy the rolls in the process unless you put an alum. or MS cover on the wear surface Sorry for straying a bit off topic, my apologies to the topic starter
Reply:The rep was talking 4" radius bends for 1/2" stuff, I thought it was a bit extreme, but who am I to say, he is the one that is supposed to know the stuff inside and out. I have a piece and see what you mean about the weld pattern. I don't do that type of heavy forming, have no equipment for it, but I find it interesting at how the rep sung a different song. Then I talk to someone like yourself who has formed it and find out how it really plays out.  What about the toxicity of it, he never mentioned any specific precautions.Owner of Bushwacker Mobile WeldingPictures
Reply:You'd have to check the MSDS on it ( which said rep is responsible to supply you with )...I don't know exactly, but I do know that it gives off a sickingly sweet smell when you're fitting it quite unlike anything I've ever encountered. Maybe I 'm guessing, but I'm sure it's not good for you. If it is the same rep that is constantly at our shop, a small dark skinned guy with glasses...Noel?? When he says 4 inch radius, we have taken narrow strips of 4 or 5 inches down to that radius for 8 inch lines...but like I say, it's very dicy...you only want your most experienced guys working with it, cause it requires paying close attention to what's going on...give a job like that to a kid and he might take his head off...when ya got about 200 tons of force on something and it snaps...pieces tend to fly...not to mention a bang that is enough to cause you to soil your pants.If it's the same rep I'm thinking of he is in tight with one of our salesman but our foreman can't stand the guy. He threw him out of the shop one day...Bahahah what a laugh.
Reply:Nope, my rep is about 230lbs, 6'0 white around 45-50. I'll get the MSDS from him next time I talk to him. For some reason his name is escaping me at the moment.Owner of Bushwacker Mobile WeldingPictures