Welding Tips and Tricks

I've got a medium gas lens, but wanted a cup larger than an 8. This proved harder to find than I initially expected. Still unclear if they even exist, or if my two LWSs are staffed by relative incompetents (both may be true)

Due to my lack of desire to wait for parts to come into my preferred LWS, and the knowledge that half the part numbers in the prostar catalog are wrong anyway, meaning the part you waited for will not actually be that part after all, I came up with this.

Two stubby no.11 cups JBwelded together with scotch brite at the outlet to help keep things flowing well. Bumped the CFH up to 20 and solved my medium lens cup compatibility problem.

Freeing me up to address another problem which I'll start a thread on over in TIG. Anyhow, here it is.

Everything I did with it today was at 70 amps and short bursts, so I didn't get a chance to put it through high amperage hell or anything, but for the time being it looks like an easy way to put off the 30 dollar purchase of a large lens.

Looks good, let us know how it holds up.

~John

You might want to rethink getting a real gas lens and proper lens cup because it will pay for itself the first time you refill your argon cylinder.

Running 70 amps, I only need about 10-12 CFH with a #6 cup and standard gas lens on my PTA-17v torch.

Also, it seems like your "screen" should be farther back in the cup so that the gas flow pattern can take the shape of the cup outlet. I'd be surprised if you don't have a gas dispersion similar to a standard collet with the screen right at the end of the cup.

Bill
Novice welder so my 2 cents is probably only worth 2 cents...

John,

Put her through a bit more of a workout today, she's holding up well. I'm going to do some 6061 tubing stuff this week with a 3/32 around 120A, should get a better idea about JBweld's ability to stick to ceramics.