i wouldn't bother with a plasma cutter. a grinder will do everything you need. far more important things to get before plasma cutters. also for learning welding, i highly recommend starting with stick. its not as hard as you think and once you get reasonable with that, it makes learning mig and tig ...

i think my previous explanation was a bit crap.
ac freq is probably better thought of like dc pulse but Ep is peak amps. and EP is background amps. unfortunately my cheap machines don't have individual en/ep adjustments or any fancy waveforms.

i have not heard of that before, so i don't really know.
however i just regard tungsten as an expendable and just cut it off. i'm still on the same packet i got many years ago, so its not really an expense worth trying to save. cleaning with acid sounds like more work for minimal gain.

i don't think "keeping oxide layer under assault" is a thing. once its cleaned its under gas coverage and not reforming. If the electrons are switching at much higher rate, then the oxide layer is constantly being eroded (hence, assaulted) otherwise with higher freq you get more times its...

I turn up the frequency to prevent overpenetration. This an example of a debated topic. With a frequency of 400Hz, I can get the same, if not better, than at 90Hz. How? Why? To understand that you have to examine what the frequency is actually doing to the electrons and the switching from EP to EN....

I found this topic on Google and thought I'd join the conversation. I ' m a hobbyist welder, learning more about TIG welding techniques and eager for advice! Are there any tips on how to best set up the machine for welding 1/4-inch aluminum with limited amperage? for the machine i recommend low fre...

kinda curious about this. If you have a older mig welder that has a stitch function with user definable on/off time, isn't that the same as having a newer welder with a pulse function? If not, what's the difference? two completely different uses as well as tech stitch is for doing stitch welding, i...

i have no idea what would stick to lead.
i would be inclined to simply box it in.

yeah its quiet. but that can be kinda nice.
but even other big forums are fairly quiet these days. social media has really taken a bite out of forums, but i find forums are still better for asking questions and getting real answers. so i try to help out and keep it going.

Chips O'Toole wrote: ↑Fri Oct 11, 2024 11:36 am I love my friend, but he is the kind of person who has to learn from his own mistakes. Can't say I'm totally innocent in that regard.

sounds like most of us. some things you just have to learn the hard way.

i found what it is. its a hand held inverter. ie a small inverter packaged so it can be hand held. but to make it light enough, its going to be really underpowered for even 3/32 rods. just yet another cheap junk. more than likely way underpowered and the weight would be huge. good basic inverter sti...

thats so funny.
the old "i want to weld something together but i don't want to learn welding".

j422 i think is one of the asian rod codes.

If you were welding stainless tables, sinks or conveyors for the food industry you would need to purge the entire room you were working in. Besides the cost of the gas, you'd need a firefighter's respirator or a scuba tank or you'd die immediately. not really. you simply use purge blocks or even op...

don't worry about the table, we all start somewhere.
i started on the ground with a couple of bricks. got a cheap little foldable table now and done a lot of stuff on that.

also tungsten stick out. with 5 cup its really short and really hard to see. bigger cup means you can poke it out some more and it can be easier to see. if stick out is to long, your going to get contaminated welds.

post a pic of the schematics if you can.

Thanks. I think I'm making some progress. I went back over the holes and it seems to be some sort of surface tension in the puddle (like a bubble). I imagine that could be for a number of reasons and I will have to try numerous things to see what the core problem is. It seems impossible to close th...

first thing i would do is to increase the cup size to an 8. also bump the pre flow up a bit. do not use cheap unknown quality consumables when learning. stick to good well known brands. poor performing cheap stuff will have you going around in circles questioning everything. the less variables the b...

don't forget fans.
masks don't stop gases. best thing you can do is simply vent the smoke and supply fresh air.

not at the moment.
see the Announcement on the main page. the forum doesn't get a whole lot of traffic so i doubt its a high priority.

They totally sprung this on me. It was due at the site by the time they got me the parts. I finished welding it, turned around and it was gone. Unless I can get someone to passivate it on a building several stories above the ground, I guess we're screwed in 2 years (sigh). I actually used a #5 cup ...

All stainless is prone to rust if you weld it and create “sugaring”. Sanitary piping is all 316 and must be fully purged, autogenous mostly. If you even think about welding it without a purge, you will fail every inspection. a lot of sanitary pipe is 304, it depends on the industry. you can often b...

Stainless doesn't all oxidize equally. 304 rusts. 308L, not so much. 316L is actual marine grade SS. I think the main (only) differences are the level of chromium and L for low carbon. I TIG welded rusted out stainless steel airplane mufflers which was almost impossible without blowing more holes i...

you guys must have hot rod and bike clubs over there that deal with engineers. just ask them what they normally do. i'm sure they already have it worked out. over here only pro's can do that sort of job. diy on critical parts is completely illegal. even for the pro's that would go though an engineer...

clamp a heatsink to it. eg big chunk of aluminum.