Welding Tips and Tricks

Hey everyone, I have a welding competition coming up on March 18 that could pay for my school. It's a vertical up pad with 3/32 7018 on a 9x5 3/8" inch plate. He wants the beads overlapped around 48%. Iv'e been doing pretty good but sometimes i have dips and vallys and sometimes i have bumps and sometimes i have a little vally in between the beads even when i overlap them a lot. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Keep your beads narrow and your amps high. This will help flatten out the stringer. Turn up the amps 3-5 at a time till you can't control it at all. I.E. it's dripping and you can't keep up. Then back down just a bit and practice.

Should I do any motion or run it straight up? I've done both but haven't figured out which works better just yet.

And do your best to find a method to support your hands, and slide your arms. Once you have the correct arc length, maintaining that and the rod angle contributes greatly to consistency of your weld.

I try to hold steady. I can't so it looks like a slight weave.

If your amperage is right you should be able to nearly bury the tip of the rod in the puddle and just "feel" your way up with a slight side to side weave. It takes a light grip on the stinger to be able to feel when the flux touches the sides, don't death grip it. "Feeling" you way though will help with consistency. Take your time and breath between passes to relax yourself and give the test plate time to cool a little. Your stick should be 10 to 15 degrees uphill.