mig torch feed liner life

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Injecting a half cc or so of molybdenum disulfide oil into the feed end of the liner keeps the wire feed running smoothly; as good as a new liner but much easier and less expensive.  You may need to try more or less but more doesn't seem to hurt anything.  Worst case a little excess oil will blow out with the shielding gas.  Don't use a dry lubricant though, it somehow will find its way onto your feed rollers and wire.  I do this when I put in a new spool; been running with the same liner the machine came with three years and several 10 lb. spools ago.
Reply:What is that stuff ? Is there  a more common name ?
Reply:yea i wish i could do that but a holes always kink the hose n it destroys the liner in the class but i will do that on my home machine ..... and like canadian said what is it?
Reply:It's most well-known use is as a tapping fluid.  It is far better than any other lubricant I've tried at reducing metal to metal friction.  The only metals I've machined that it doesn't help are molybdenum and tungsten although there are surely others.  But it makes an extraordinary difference in the MIG wire guide.  If I ever have to replace one I'll inject some before using the new one.  There may be competitive brands but I don't have any information on them.MOLY-DEE TAPPING FLUIDMSDS# 05086Product use LubricantCode 05086-BW, BTManufacturer Castrol Industrial North America, Inc.150 W. Warrenville RoadNaperville, IL 60563Supplier Castrol Industrial North America, Inc.150 W. Warrenville RoadNaperville, IL 60563Product Information: 1-800-621-2661 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting**************1-800-621-2661******end_of_the_skype_highlighting
Reply:Very first post to tell us about a product and second one to give us phone numbers were we can buy it.
Reply:The telephone number is that of the manufacturer, Castrol Industrial North America, Inc.  If you get a person on the line they might refer you to a distributor.  I don't know where it might be purchased, but I assume Castrol should know.
Reply:How many of those welds have been inspected after using that oil in the liner scenario . liners , 8 bucks air arcing a weld out , minimum 20 minutes set up time having a inspector wait for me to air arc - reweld , 200 bucks a hour , ill buy new liners and switch them out any dayI forgot how to change this.
Reply:Any kind of oil in contact with the mig wire seems counter-intuitive to me.  Even though it's mixed with moly, still sounds oily.Miller Syncrowave 350Millermatic 252/ 30A spoolgunMiller Bobcat 225g w/ 3545 spoolgunLincoln PowerArc4000Lincoln 175 Mig  Lincoln 135 Mig Everlast 250EX TigCentury ac/dc 230 amp stickVictor O/AHypertherm 1000 plasma
Reply:And that you should; I'm not advocating that anyone violate a quality policy.  You would be entirely out of line if you were welding for a defense contractor or any of countless other iso certified manufacturers and introduced anything into your process that violated their standard.  But there are quite a few fellows out on the farm welding gates and cattle guards that could use the spare change for milk and bread and having to put up with thirty seconds worth of odd smelling smoke from their first weld is not going to be a big deal.  I'm curious though, do you suppose that new liner has been vapor phase degreased and that the wire is entirely free of drawing lubricants?Last edited by glempoppa; 01-09-2011 at 01:39 AM.Reason: added 'first' before weld to make it clearer that it only happens initially.
Reply:Don't know for sure but I'd imagine the copper clad would be drawn 1st, cladding 2nd."The things that will destroy America are prosperity at any price, peace at any price, safety first instead of duty first, the love of soft living and the get rich quick theory of life." -Theodore Roosevelt
Reply:Copper-clad steel wire is produced by cladding a rod of steel core material with a copper strip and then drawing the clad rod to obtain a desired wire diameter. Both the steel core rod and the copper are thoroughly cleaned prior to cladding to make a complete bimetallic metallurgical bond possible. The drawing process that follows cladding further enhances the bond sufficiently that in the end the bond between the two metals is inseparable. ©2004 Tigertek, Inc. All rights reserved.The source cited here does not mention that the first process after cladding is a rotary swaging operation to reduce the copper clad rod to a small enough diameter to be introduced to the drawing line.   The drawing line pulls the swaged, steel/copper rod through successively smaller die diameters until the finished diameter is reached.  The thickness of the copper relative to the core is determined at the outset by the core/copper ratio.   It also does not mention that lubrication is required at each die station in order to produce a smooth surface finish, prolong die life and facilitate this severe forming operation.  The lubricant used may be oil or in some cases a plating process that applies a thin plate of a lubricious metal such as tin.  I don’t know what MIG wire manufacturers use to optimize their drawing operation nor do I know if they remove the residue or plate after drawing.  It most likely really doesn’t matter or it would likely appear in their marketing information.The steel wire used to make the tightly coiled helix used as the wire liner is also manufactured by swaging and drawing.  Lubrication is almost certainly used in forming the liner turns.  A major use of this material is control cable assemblies where lubrication is highly desirable.    So a question:  will someone out there please explain to me what happens to the liner to require that it be replaced.  I’m asking for the basic failure mode, not the obvious ‘wire starts hanging up’ answer.And I do appreciate President Roosevelt’s statement.  His prophetic words ring true and are entirely relevant today when so many of our jobs have been sacrificed to greed and profit at the expense of the American Craftsman.
Reply:Originally Posted by glempoppaCopper-clad steel wire is produced by cladding a rod of steel core material with a copper strip and then drawing the clad rod to obtain a desired wire diameter. Both the steel core rod and the copper are thoroughly cleaned prior to cladding to make a complete bimetallic metallurgical bond possible. The drawing process that follows cladding further enhances the bond sufficiently that in the end the bond between the two metals is inseparable. ©2004 Tigertek, Inc. All rights reserved.The source cited here does not mention that the first process after cladding is a rotary swaging operation to reduce the copper clad rod to a small enough diameter to be introduced to the drawing line.   The drawing line pulls the swaged, steel/copper rod through successively smaller die diameters until the finished diameter is reached.  The thickness of the copper relative to the core is determined at the outset by the core/copper ratio.   It also does not mention that lubrication is required at each die station in order to produce a smooth surface finish, prolong die life and facilitate this severe forming operation.  The lubricant used may be oil or in some cases a plating process that applies a thin plate of a lubricious metal such as tin.  I don’t know what MIG wire manufacturers use to optimize their drawing operation nor do I know if they remove the residue or plate after drawing.  It most likely really doesn’t matter or it would likely appear in their marketing information.The steel wire used to make the tightly coiled helix used as the wire liner is also manufactured by swaging and drawing.  Lubrication is almost certainly used in forming the liner turns.  A major use of this material is control cable assemblies where lubrication is highly desirable.    So a question:  will someone out there please explain to me what happens to the liner to require that it be replaced.  I’m asking for the basic failure mode, not the obvious ‘wire starts hanging up’ answer.And I do appreciate President Roosevelt’s statement.  His prophetic words ring true and are entirely relevant today when so many of our jobs have been sacrificed to greed and profit at the expense of the American Craftsman.
Reply:I thank everyone who responded to my post for sharing their professional opinion and the candor with which they delivered it.  I especially thank Oldiron2 for his informed commentary on the wire guide failure modes and his familiarity with oil dispersed MoS2   My introduction to your forum may have been more beneficial if I had not made the statement in my first post about blowing a little oil out of the gun with the shielding gas and that not being a problem. Molybdenum disulfide is an extreme pressure lubricant, the kind of stuff used as the active component in wire drawing stations and in hypoid gearboxes.   The second failure mode Oldiron2 cited, friction between the wire and the liner, causing erosive wear, is the one the careful, attentive welder is almost certainly going to experience first as a lurching erratic wire feed.   This is a typical failure sequence:   the copper clad wire experiences very large forces against the wire guide as the feed rollers push it around bends; the sharper  the bend the higher the forces.  Copper, if clean is a metal that welds to itself under pressure.  If the pressure between the wire and the liner is high enough and both surfaces are chemically clean, the copper clad wire will leave traces of copper bonded to the liner.  As wire continues to be fed through the system enough copper will adhere to the liner that the welder will feel the wire lurching in the guide which prompts replacement.   I’m going to change my technique for minimizing this one type of failure.  Instead of injecting the dispersion into the guide I will cut a small block of felt and slip it over the wire where is enters the guide and put a couple of drops of the lubricant on the felt.  The amount carried on the wire will be imperceptible but will go a long way to extend the life of the guide and reduce feed rate variations.