[Horse]

Hi guys,

I'm an Aussie Boilermaker in heavy construction. I mainly do iron ore plants,coal plants and the occational gas power station. As a boilermaker I actually don't do a lot of welding these days as it is mostly prefab and brought to site. However I'm being called upon to do more and more 4G. Now to my challenge.

I seem to always have trouble with the weld not getting enough penetration ie. not gathering the top edges. The weld tends to sag or I just can't get the penetration. We can't use a backing strip in most cases. I've tried using a knife edge V butt joint with and without gap, with landings with gap. with various amperage settings.
I've watched various videos but they do not show joint preparation. I try to keep the stick at 90 degrees with a tight arc. Over here we use 2.6mm 7016 for root runs and then 3.2mm 7018's for hot passes and capping.

What are your thoughts??

Cheers Horse

[mwallace61]

Can you run it with a 6010?

[rickbreezy]

well, where i'm at we use 6010 for an open butt v groove weld for penetration, it always does the trick. As for a backing strip, I think you should angle the rod away from the puddle, this will help the arc to dig in a bit better. It works for me, anyway.

-Rick