I still use the ones I got from Empire Abrasives, but I've switched to the fine grit 120 and I like those better. Plenty aggressive enough and last way longer than the coarse grit ones that tend to disintegrate quickly if you hit an edge. Silicon Carbide does like to bite into bare steel pretty agg...

A decent handheld tungsten grinder (a la Sharpies) are nowhere near $2,000 (usually under $300) and provide variable grind angles and tungsten diameters. They produce very high quality grinds consistently enough for code work, hobby work, production work and nearly everything short of high spec cod...

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Yup, as others have said, annealed unhardened A2 is just going to cost you a whole lot more money than anything, I'm not entirely convinced with the right filler and such welding harder steels to mild steels tends to be perhaps quite as brittle as it has a reputation for being. I've welded random hi...

MTS has been fine when I've used their tungsten, Haven't ran more than a few pieces of it, as it was what the school used and I wasn't going to turn down another piece of tungsten :D. To be completely honest, if someone else said MTS seemed to hold up even a little bit better than CK I wouldn't doub...

Just going to mention, for those who can't afford a $2,000 diamond wheel sharpener that'll leave a perfect polished point. If you aren't already pretty damned experienced, you'll probably never notice the difference between a piece of tungsten sharpened on a clamped down angle grinder and a 40 grit ...

Yes, budget/import lenses simply suck, maybe not always, but sometimes they do exactly what you're seeing there, and I'm speaking from person experience, I'd first suspect a poor quality gas lens, if that doesn't fix the issue, You may try snugging all the fittings on your hose on regulator up a goo...

Yup post a pic of the break, that would be the best way for us to tell you the ideal method of repair, that being said, While getting them even briefly to 400f shouldn't compromise their heat treatment as pistol targets, because hell unless you're shooting magnum calibers you could easily use mild s...

Yeah, multiprocess is a bit of a misnomer in the sub 3.5k market, unless it has high freq start and will AC tig, it's a stick and mig welder that you can run scratch/liftarc tig on just like literally ANY other stick welder. I'm not saying they don't have their place, but they're not exactly cost sa...

A 1000lb object isn't necessarily going to be a static 1000lb load to the magnet either, what happens if the magnet swings to a stop or the piece being moved hits something by mistake?

I've seen more than one student shock the hell out of themselves because they instinctively lit up with the filler rod practically in between the tungsten and the work piece, one quit because of it. HF goes where it wants, including through gloves and clothing, you just have to make sure you're not ...

My welding teacher had a somewhat similar 20hp motor setup to run his 3 phase shop equipment, 240v single phase to 480v 3 phase, so it's not as uncommon as it might seem, not sure if it was quite as complicated as yours though :D. Other's here are a lot more familiar with 3 phase setups than I am, s...

Here's the result from a couple weeks ago after more than a month of not tig welding aluminum

Honestly my first beads being so cold and sloppy were from the tungsten acting differently as much as they were from me being out of practice though.

Pyrex will help a bit, But an Optrel e684 or Crystal 2.0 will work wonders. It adjusts the shade level, on-the-fly, from about 5 to 13, in response to the arc intensity right as your welding. There is an adjustable "bias" so if it doesn't dark enough, you can shift it slightly darker, or ...

We're pretty laid back, anything welding/fabrication related can go in shop talk as far as I'm concerned, I agree with others that more exposure, a bit more activity on the forum would be nice, however I've found most welding groups to be full of ***holes who like mocking newbies despite posting no ...

Looks like you've got a plenty valid reason then, definitely not a lack of skill problem ;). As for the unit itself, can you contact the MFG, warranty it? That just sounds exceptionally sloppy for over a $1000 unit. Possibly a bad/loose connection, turning the dial up is increasing voltage enough to...

Yeah, brazing without melting the cast is the safe bet, that being said, I've welded a little bit of cast successfully myself, and my advice is to clean the HELL out of it, soak it in simple green overnight, then soak it in citric acid and scrub it down to bright shiny metal, then repeat both proces...

I like ER312, not saying it's the best out there, but it's used often for welding dissimilar and high carbon steels. I've had excellent luck using it to weld AR400, whatever grader blades are made out of etc.

For some reason I thought this was about how to Bypass having to buy the $700 software update, and I spent a long time scratching my head lmao. I was gonna do it as a favor for the local community college on the Dynasty 280 DX

My advice, lightly lube the wheel and all metal components prior to reassembly with a quality synthetic base lubricant, Certain firearm lubricants work fantastic in a pinch and a lot better than anything off the shelf of a big box store, Hornady one shot, weapon shield etc. If you use a more viscous...

Not to go off topic, but are you using a tig feeder due to production demands, like welding very long lengths of sheet metal or due to issues feeding the rod by hand?

Also your name wouldn't be inspired by drizzt do'urden by any chance would it? one of my favorite series

Yup, you can stack dimes with a 6010 very well, In fact I used to think the whole stack of dimes thing came from an expertly stick welded 6010 bead rather than tig, and I still wonder if the term might have originated there. I wish I still had my Invertec 275 to run some Lincoln 5+ and really stack ...

Jesus, that board is toast, literally. If it could even be fixed it'd cost more than the board is worth unfortunately. I'm doubtful that the huge scorch marks, and melted.. are those resistors? I can't even tell, are just discoloration. Me thinks it let the magic smoke out. On the bright side, if yo...

Heh, the F1 approach, I'm going to have to use that phrase

BillEDee stops in here at my shop frequently, so yea, it does happen. We're in PA though, so we don't like them craw-dad crushers from daan sauth! Lol. Just kidding. I've not taken notice to other members in NC, but there's likely some around. Heh, I lived everywhere from Arizona to NM, to KY to he...