Mig welding question

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What is the best way to weld? What should the weld look like? Should I pull or push the weld?Thanks for you helpAdiosJosh
Reply:wow 23 views depends on what ur doing really for structural strength .......PUSH for cosmetics .........I only pull on a down hand vertical weld Mig welding is very simple . Flux core mig , i was taught to pull  . But standard mig welder , mig welding always push ur defeting the purpose by pullin . The name of tha game is penetration . The wire comes out the tip , and the wire is being forced buy some spools and an electric motor . U use that force the wire is comming out the whip and PUSH with it . u are creating penetration Pulling ......u will create build up and lots of it , there might be some aplication for it but i never heard of it . When u pull ,  its actually defeating the purpose stick welding is commonly pulled , there are a few push applications  . But  there is no mechanical force pushin the rod into the material ur welding . Just the rod burning off  . thats  is  y mig is so commonly used . Cheap to run and lots of penatration
Reply:Thank you very much that helps a lot. d(^_^)bAdiosJosh
Reply:Don't want to step on any toes, and if I am wrong I will apologize, but you will gain a deeper penetration pulling a mig gun because you are applying more heat to the joint. actually the deepest penetration is to hold the gun perpendicular. True it will load up when pulling, but only if your travel speed is too slow. Just as it will with a rod.  I don't think that there is anymore force applied to a weld for creating penetration with wire feeding into the puddle than it is when feeding a rod into a puddle.  You have to push a rod into the puddle as the rod burns just as wire has to feed in to take up for what has been melted. with that said I usually do "push"  my mig guns, but when i get into heavy plate I usually pull it.   Here is a link to Miller's tip section.   http://www.millerwelds.com/education...tips/MIG_tips/      It will give you a good over view of what to do when Mig welding.  and also has a display of the different bead contour/penetration for a given gas, or weld technique. Good luck.  ~Jackson
Reply:Now how should I lay a weld? Like should I just go go go or make a bead then another then another. How fast should I go? Should I move the tip in a certain pattern, what should the weld look like, and what should I be looking for as I weld?I made my first square tube and I threw it off my garage and the welds held but they look realy bad.Thanks for you helpAdiosJosh
Reply:Now how should I lay a weld? Like should I just go go go or make a bead then another then another.
Reply:Viper, it might be easier for you to get an idea of a good bead if you take a couple pcs of 3/16 plate and tack them in a 't' shapeand then stand it up so you can run downhill passes. Its thick enough that you wont burn through and all you have to do is hold the cone against both sides of the 't', angle your gun down about 30 deg, and just kinda drag the gun down as you weld. Watch that the puddle doesnt get too big[1/4 inch wide]   Hammack and Sandy are tellin' it true.
Reply:Viper, I would suggest getting yourself a couple of good welding books.  things like speed etc, and what a bead should look like are alot easier explained when you have pictures in front of you than us trying to explain it here.  Might even see if you could find a welding course somewhere close to you.  Not that we mind helping at all, just think it would be easier on you. Good luck  ~Jackson
Reply:wow if the miller Co. says to drag . then drag i am only speaking for my experince ( self taught ) that is from welding my self and teaching robots to mig weld .And as far was all position mig welding , vertical down weld with mig is garbage , same with stick a flat or horizontal mig weld is stongest , when i am in a jam with vertical mig welds i weld big tacks on top of on another and head up hill . till it looks like a roll od quartersLast edited by windsormw; 08-12-2005 at 05:23 PM.
Reply:WOW guys thanks a lot I realy appreciate it. I was accualy considering taking a welding class at a local college but I can only take one clas and its between auto repair, welding and metal working/fabrication. I was looking at barnes and noble and I don't know if I was looking hard enough or not but could find anything on welding and also checked a local hard ware store and could find any books. I might search on barnes and nobles web site and see if they have anything but I would rather buy the book in store than online. I realy apreciate all your guys help.Thanks againAdiosJosh
Reply:Viper, Check the autoparts stores.  I know that the people that make the auto repair manuals make a welding manual.  I flipped thru one the other day by "Haynes"  while shopping for some parts.  It was decent covered the basics and plenty of pictures.  Good luck,   ~Jackson
Reply:I just finished my level 'c' welding course in victoria, british columbia and it includes welding tee, laps, open corner joints, groove welds with 1 square side and the other with a 30 degree bevel with a half inch gap and a backing plate, and groove weld with a single v with both bevels @ 37.5 degrees with an open root, square butt joints with 12 guage sheet metal, spray transfer and short circuit transfer in flat, horizontal, and the verticals with S6, T9, and T11 wires (spray transfer with S6 in the flat and horizontal positions) and also flat and horizontal aluminum with 5356 wire and i noticed that the greatest amount of penetration is done by pulling not pushing because the wire is being fed into the puddle which is already hot. By pushing you are feeding the wire into the part that has not yet been touched by the weld puddle, therefore it is "cold". For all of the fillet welds and backing plate groove welds I pulled to get the greatest amount of penetration i could, for the open root groove welds i pushed for the root pass so that i could get some penetration but not so much that it would burn holes right through and then i pulled for the fill passes, for all of my sheet metal i pushed so that i wouldn't burn through, and for aluminum i pushed because aluminum heats up extremely fast. I have some pictures if anyone would like to use them as examples of what it should look like and if you disagree upon what they look like then just tell me what you think of them.(top to bottom) Flat tee, flat open corner, horizontal tee (all with T9 wire)Vertical up tee joint with T9 wire sheet metal tee joints vertical down with S6 wire Aluminum flat tee joint with 5356 wire
Reply:WOWThanks guys Ill check the auto shops.Thanks for all the tips!AdiosJosh
Reply:man i feel stupid I guess u can see what a educated welder is taught an what an on-site taught guy is taugththanks for the input , i seen those pics ( layed er in there nice ) . All that i known of mig welding has went to $hit . I never had a weld fail yet , but i am very happy that i signed on to this site . I had done quite a bit of MIG welding in my past( i use to consider myself good )  but now a days most welding i do is stick . And "GUY" .......paragraphs are ur friend
Reply:Hey windsormw, do not feel stupid!!!! Life is a learning experience! NOBODY starts out knowing everything. (took me a year or so) You work, you learn, you pass it on. Nobody was trying to make you feel bad. You never had a weld fail so you must be doing something right.Keep learning!!!
Reply:Well thanks to all your guys help and tips, along w/ the welders hand book, I am finaly starting to get this mig welding thing down. I had a certified welder look at my welds and he said that they are realy good \(^o^)/. And we are trying to get my grandpas old stick welder working that he literaly build himself. We got looking around our garage and found TONS of sticks for stick welding and a miniature brazing torch. We replaced the plug and re-atached the clap to the cable and it gets electricity in but the switch isn't working so we are going to replace that and hopefully soon I can learn how to stick weld ^_^.AdiosJoshWelding is never having to buy something.
Reply:Glad you're having fun. I just noticed your signature line and it's so true. I just got my mig setup recently and I've already made a satellite dish mount out of pipes which I could not have done without welding. This is in addition to filling trim holes in my car which is why I bought it primarily.I wish I had more stuff to weld...
Reply:Yeah welding is cool I like it. I can't wait to get more junk to weld together either. I can't wait to get my grandpas old stick welder working again (that he built himself).Welding is never having to buy something.
Reply:I was taught to always push but I must admit that I learned aluminum mig before steel. With aluminum if you try to drag the weld will be black because the weld is not being covered with your shielding gas. And you can see the impurities in the puddle. For me it stands to reason that with steel you will get better gas coverage by pushing hence a cleaner weld. I have some aluminum welding pics I can post not very close up though. I can get some better pics tomorrow at work. Attached Images
Reply:Now Im a little bit confused, I read that gas isn't needed with flux wire is this wrong cuz right now we just have the mig welder w/ flux wire. If we need gas what kind? Im pritty sure its co2 but if wrong please correct me.ThanksAdiosJosh*oh and what exactly is that in the picture, looks interesting?Welding is never having to buy something.
Reply:no gas necessary for flux core.  There are some applications where you use both flux core and gas.  Search on dual shield for both mixes and applications.Smithboy...if it ain't broke, you ain't tryin'.
Reply:You can use gas with flux cored wire with better results. But if you are just tinkering around gas less flux cored wire is fine. I prefer a 98% argon 2% Oxygen mix for mig welding but this mix is more costly than other mixes. The most common gas mix for steel including flux cored would be 75% argon 25% c02. The pic is a repair job that I worked on a few weeks ago. It's An aluminum dump trailer. The pics where taken from inside the bed looking toward the inside of the nose section of the trailer. I'll post a few more here that will give you a better ideal of the trailer. and some better pics of Aluminum welds close up. Attached Images
Reply:WOW!  Your not a professional, now are ya!  How did you get those welds with such a nice bead profile, almost a tig look?  I was curious if you've used or seen the welds produced with the Lincoln setup that's a pulse on pulse waveform?   Nice work bye the way   As for the original poster, I found two of the books out there very very usefull.  The Lincoln Welders Bible, and Millers GMAW books are the best bang for the buck I've found in welding books.  The GMAW book is more an introduction to mig, and the welders bible is what I would call a 200 level book/class literature.  Good Job!  Keep it up!  Brian Lee  Sparkeee24
Reply:Yes last week I used a linclon push pull rig thats brand new in our shop. No I did not get to use the pulse feature in fact i did  not even know it had a pulse feature or what it was untill a guy from the welding supply co. came and was telling us about the machine after that another welder was using the machine and I saw welds done in pulse setting. The other welder showed me a bead and said that he just pushed a straight pass and the machine proudced the weave. It was not uniform and when he asked me what I thought I told him I did not like it and he agreed that nither did he. but thats not a very good evaluation of this feature.It may be great. I kinda dont like automation stuff. For example robot welders
Reply:Check the welding section at Lowes and Home Depot. They both have a book on the shelf I think.I'm not a Engineer, I just play one on the weekend.Man you talk about being humbled.  I'm a pretty good stick welder. I see a lot of work in ornamental fence where mig is much better suited. So I just built a 9' walk bridge for a customer and used a mig. The thing is like two arched fence sections with 3.5' boards between them.I thought I did good after practicing some. So I built the bridge. I had a lot of trouble witht he spool getting too tight. I would loosen the plastic nut but it lept tigtening up itself.Other than that though I was happy. I tested a few welds and thought I was doing great. I build this fabulous looking bridge. Loaded it up on my trailer and drove to the customers place about 100 miles.Broke welds all over the place! So today I'm going to fix it with a stick welder. Dang! oh well at least some fat lady didn't crash on it.I just built a walk 9' walj bridge for a customer. I
Reply:TPnTX, That suxs man,  I have run into the problem with the small spools tighening on the smaller migs before also.  As far as the mig welds, you always here that a mig weld can be done by anyone.  well anyone can make a nice looking mig weld but to make one that looks nice and holds, you have to know what you are doing.  Mig machines can lay a nice bead and have aboslutely no penetration.  Something hard to do with a stick.  Just keep playing with your heat and you will get the hang of it.  I am mainly a stick welder, and i went thru some of what you are going thru when i bought my first mig.  It will come to ya. just hang in there.  ~JacksonI'm a Lover, Fighter, Wild horse Rider, and a pretty good welding man......
Reply:I don't think windsor is completely wrong in his assessment of the situation, but we may have had a language breakdown here.  Pushing a MIG weld with slightly higher-than-required heat input will end up producing good penetration WITH excellent gap filling (if you can work it correctly, and this takes some practice).Amp for amp, drag gun produces the highest heat input into the base metal - this is something that most will agree on - but if you have some spare heat and want to fill a gap faster (and you can travel quickly but controlled) then a high heat/push technique will fill a hell of a gap with completely solid fusion.Where that sort of approach might break down is in thinner applications where excess heat input will lead to greater distortion, but if all you're welding is 1/8" tube (for example) that's beveled or has slightly poor fitup, you can overheat/push and have a solid single-pass weld.So basically what I'm saying is that both sides are correct, under the right circumstances.Just my $.02MR
Reply:So basically what I'm saying is that both sides are correct, under the right circumstances.
Reply:Darn right, Sandy.MR
Reply:Question. So what am I/Are we doing different than the professional, robot controlled mig welders in the factories.  I mean we both use mig/wire feeders how do they KNOW that their welds will hold and I have to wonder if mine will. I havent had one break yet, but reading the threads I start to doubt myself.I'm not a Engineer, I just play one on the weekend.
Reply:Originally Posted by dlturmanQuestion. So what am I/Are we doing different than the professional, robot controlled mig welders in the factories.  I mean we both use mig/wire feeders how do they KNOW that their welds will hold and I have to wonder if mine will. I havent had one break yet, but reading the threads I start to doubt myself.
Reply:... and three, your change sir. I agree with Sandy on the overweld strategy, for sure.However, you've also got to consider the fact that robotic welding is done mainly in a straight-up relative position (i.e. very little gun tilt, if any) from what I've seen in my very limited experience.  So really, what's dragging and what's pushing when you're square to the face?Also, process engineers can fine-tune robotic welds to a T.  You can tweak setting after setting until you get what you want to see, DESPITE your approach.  When we strike an arc manually, we're dancing with the puddle, penetration, heat input and warpage, and trying to make all of it fit into a situation that comes out looking like complete fusion with good wash-in but without undercutting.  We don't have 50 gajillion test pieces (where I come from, a gajillion is a lot) to tweak our settings, and our EXACT motions aren't reproducible down to the millisecond and millimetre.So, we just gotta dance with the one that brung us.   MR