cj737 and tweake, some really good advice here. Thanks very much. I hadn't considered using thicker filler as a laywire technique. I'll give it a shot. I do have plenty of 1/16" 304 rod. When you say that the notches need their ends ground to ensure a fillet weld all the way around, can you cla...

cj - Again, thanks for the advice. To clarify, the tubing butts into the solid handle and the tubing is "notched" to fit as tight as I can get it. If you're familiar with a C-stand (film industry tool) you'll get the picture. The solid "handle" is essentially a piece of rod stick...

Basically got my notching rig set up and it works nicely. Still working over the bending side of things but I'm in touch with Bend Tech and it sounds promising. So I welded my first frame together this morning and I must say, it was a b&*ch. The handle for the frame is 3/8" stainless rod (s...

Good idea. Did some of that already but burned through a bit too much tubing... All good though. But I agree, nothing like finding out for yourself.

cj737 - There you are again! I looked up Bend Tech. Had no idea they existed but they seem highly competent. I'm in touch with them on their software so I can get the right package. Thanks again for what you're doing out there for us new guys...

Long shot on this forum but this is for anyone who has experience fabricating using thin wall tubing (0.035" wall) with small tubing size (0.375" OD). I'm making flags for the film industry from this material. They are 48" long and 5.75" wide outside-to-outside, rectangular. They...

cj - Thanks very much. I had considered hole saws but could never find one at 3/8". I'll check the Starrett site. I do, however, have four brand new 3/8" tungsten carbide burrs that I think I could jig up in a die grinder. As long as I can hold it still and feed my tubing into it that migh...

I'm building frames from 3/8" stainless steel rod and 3/8" stainless steel tubing @ 0.035" wall. I don't have a notcher so am having to notch the intersections of these items by hand. I can do this with a cut-off wheel I suppose. But is there a better way? Any ideas would be appreciat...

Good. Going over to do it right now. I'll let you know how it goes. But certainly no problem clamping the DP out of it! ;)

For what it's worth, if you're welding 1/2" aluminum, you're going to need some amps. When I was starting out, I tried to weld 1/2" aluminum with a 175 amp machine. Didn't even come close to any sort of decent penetration. What is your machine set at, amps-wise? Never mind voltage. Secondl...

I'm welding 1.25", 14ga square steel tubing. 2 8" pieces cut at 45 degree to make a corner. What's best practice in terms of welding sequence to avoid the dreaded shrinkage that will leave me with an 85 degree corner when I'm done? Fillet first? Tack all 4 corners and then weld the sides? ...

Anyone had any experience welding A513-2 CREW steel tubing? Can I TIG weld it with ER70S-6? Or should I just stick with DOM (A513-5) which I am sure is easily welded?

I'm going to leave it alone and go with stainless. It's just too risky. 4130 would be nice but it's a little pricey. Thanks cj737.

Anyone had any experience welding J524 low carbon steel tubing? I'm assuming it CAN be welded. Can I use ER70S-6? My use is not structural at all. I'm fabricating lighting diffusion frames from 3/8" OD, 0.028" wall J524 tubing. Total weight = less than 5lbs. I was trying to get mild steel ...

You know, I considered that. Drilling right through both walls of the tubing. I thought it would be more time consuming but considering the time I'm spending to straighten out my 20' boomerang, I'm probably wrong about that...

Yep - if there was one thing I could improve on, not just in welding but in life, it would be that elusive quality: patience.

Working on it...

cj - Of course, you're right. It really wasn't necessary to fully weld the posts to the tube. Four spot welds per post would probably have done it. But either way... what's done is now done. I've run into this before, meaning, distortion from too much concentrated heat so I'll have to review my proc...

I've posted on this topic before but here's another one. I'm making a rope rack. I took a piece of 16ga 2" x 2" square steel tubing, 20' long. On one face, at a spacing of 6" O.C. I welded a 6" x 9/16" post perpendicular to the face. A bit like this: _____I_____I_____I_____I...

LOL! Yeah, I lasted about 3 minutes before my head started to hurt...

Fascinating! Thanks all.

I'm in Google right now - yep, a little more than knee-deep...

Jon

Can anyone explain the phenomena of magnets close to the weld? I had two pieces of 1/2" round steel rod held at 90 degrees to each other with a triangular magnet. As I welded, the arc went crazy the closer I got to the magnet. I'm assuming this is an electromagnetic effect. Certainly was surpri...

That's great. Thanks a lot.

Is there any particular advantage to this type of helmet?

Jon

Can anyone tell me where the welding helmet/face mask used in this video is available. Looks like a nice inexpensive solution to me.

http://www.weldingtipsandtricks.com/7010-overhead.html

THKS.

Jon

Keith, Can you post some pics? From another novice with some hundreds of hours under my belt but nowhere as competent or experienced as cj737 or LtBadd, I'd say that you should be doing fine with an air-cooled torch on that material. I have a 26 and it gets too hot to touch quite often but it keeps ...

I'm trying to find the video...

Can you post a link?