Welding Tips and Tricks

A guy at work said the lincoln Excalibur rods suck snd when he was doing refinery work his favorite rod was blue... well I can't remember the name but it had blue in the name. All I've used is 7018 from Lincoln, except I literally ran one hobart 7018 when new to welding. Curious to see what everyone's favorite type of rod for producing smoothest 7018 welds

I run mostly Forney rods of any kind because I can get them local for cheap. I also get Lincoln Excalibur rods from my brother in law free when they have too many or they get damaged. I really like the Lincoln rods for out of position and the Forney rods are really good flat but they still do good out of position but I prefer the lincoln rods over them for out of position. I haven't ran the Hobart rods yet.

Have not run the excalibers yet, but so far all I've heard is good things about them.

I use mostly Washington Alloy rods, some Forney - I like them both.

I do not like cheap hardware store Hobart rods, but I've been told the ones at the welder supply in 50lb boxes are better.

Excaliburs make good tomato stakes on young plants. I only buy Inweld.

I'm partial to Excalibur, but this rod is picky about how it's treated. Straight from a sealed can to a 270*F rod oven, and use within four hours of pulling from the oven, and they perform beautifully in all positions. Violate any aspect of this, like skipping the rod oven and leaving them in your box, and you are throwing the dice.

Steve S

Ferocraft 61.

If a noob like me can produce a loverly looking weld, it must be good lol

I liked using Excalibur welding rods with my Miller AC/DC buzz box, 3/32 & 1/8. For me it welds smooth. They don't sell them out here anymore, too expensive.

I've used hobart quite a bit...atom...Lincoln an a few welding supply store brands and I like Lincoln. But it's all personal preference....