Proper way to balance gases

admin

I am a beginner at OAW and am having trouble balancing my gas and oxygen pressures. I was told that the best way is to adjust/determine pressure is by choosing a tip, have no line out pressure, open the torch knob, slowly screw in the regulator knob untill I can strike the torch, slowly increase line pressure untill the acetylene flame separrates from the tip, then decrease line out pressure untill the flame returns to the tip. Then, ( with acetylene flame still burning ) repeat the proceedure for the oxygen until I get a neutral flame. When this has been done I should be properly balanced for that particular tip.  This method ensures that even if a regulator is inaccurate, the balance will be correct.My problem stems from the fact that when the acetylene flame leaves the tip, then is adjusted to return to the tip, it seem as though I have very little pressure. Am I doing anything wrong? The reason I'm trying this is because when I try to run a bead the nozzle flame seems very big, hisses and is very forcefull. The weld puddle moves around a lot and sometimes turns white with sparks flying all over the place. It makes me think my pressure is not correct. Also, my bead is just that, a series of blobs that don't melt into one another.  Does anyone have any ideas?  Thank you.
Reply:Your tip might be to large for the work you are trying to do.  If you try to turn a big tip down too low, you will have problems with the torch popping.  The gas has to come out of the tip faster than the flame can propigate back into the tip.Your procedure for setting the flow (Pressure is set with the regulators on the bottle, flow with the torch valves) sounds pretty much right.Also, don't let the white inner cone hit the metal or puddle. I think this is where your sparks are coming from.   Either that or you are running too much oxygen. Better to have too much feather (not enough O2) than too little. The white cone still has unburned oxygen. The feather has unburned fuel, which will strip oxygen from oxydized metal, unrusting it. The outer cone beyond the feather is completly burned gas that is still hot enough to glow. I like to run a slightly reducing flame (a little bit of feather still) and weld using the feather mostly.
Reply:Kevbo:  Thank you.