first tig welds on aluminum

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Finally got around to getting my Lincoln tm400/400 and hf box hooked up to try aluminum.  let me no what u think and what i can do to improve . I was welding with an air cooled tig 3/32 orange tungston lincoln 400 002.jpg (70.9 KB)  3KB lincoln 400 005.jpg (38.3 KB)   lincoln 400 009.jpg (38.1 KB)   lincoln 400 011.jpg (52.4 KB)   lincoln 400 012.jpg (78.1 KB) Attached Images
Reply:Is this a butt weld or just running a bead across the surface with no filler?If its a butt weld, it is good looking and very nice work for a first aluminum weld, I'd say.  You look to have some experience welding other materials.  If its just running a bead on a piece of metal, try running a bunch more of them, no prep in between is necessary.  And definitely do it with adding filler, and experimenting with different machine settings, tungsten stick out, cup sizes, gas flows, etc.  And then try welding some different pieces together.Only thing obvious that jumps out at me is, if you cleaned the metal before you welded with a "scratch" stainless brush and also a solvent, it would help your bead look much cleaner and shinier, and make it flow much nicer too.I'm also surprised your etched (frosty) zone isn't wider, but that's actually a good thing.  It might have something to do with using a shorter tungsten stickout and/or a smaller size cup than I am used to.
Reply:It was a butt weld it was 2 1/8 inc pices of aluminum ive done alot of stick welding but first with aluminum.  I set the contacts on the hf box and they. arc alot better now but havent had time to weld any more.  I could see the aluminum alot better than when I weld steel and it seemed like the puddel froze alot faster.
Reply:Your puddle is going to freeze much faster, due to the relatively high thermal coefficient of aluminum compared to steel.  This is why you also need more amps to weld the same thickness material of Al vs. steel.Did you add wire to that?  If you didnt, you should.  There is lots of undercutting along the sides and your "weave" isn't helping any.  Just run a straight bead with wire and see how that looks.Have we all gone mad?