Welding Tips and Tricks

Bear with me now. I am new at this tig stuff. I am a proficient mig person but as we all know anyone can do that. SO.. as the picture attached shows my cup broke and the collect is warped. keep in mind this is from the second use of this new machine i got ( Lincoln square wave 200). Some background of what i was doing? i was practicing on some mild steel angle stock bout 3/8 thick around 190 amps trying a little bit of walking the cup. Then this happened. Possible i bought some cheap cups? are there good and bad ones?

First off. The torch that comes with that welder is only good for 150 amps and is only good for short bursts over that. By walking the cup at that amperage you were severely overheating the torch head

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I don'think there are any "cheap" alumina cups out there. As DCstang pointed out, you severely overheated your cup. Cup walking is an advanced tig skill that even really good free handers have trouble with so I think you were putting the cart in front of the horse, so to speak. It's pretty uncommon to snap a cup but I managed it once welding on AC aluminum and getting my air-cooled torch so hot I could barely hold it.Anyone that knows how to sweat copper will tell you how it expands when heated. Your collet got hot, expanded and cracked your cup. I am assuming you have a 17 torch? I have the same one and regularly weld at 200amps with it but it can't sustain alot of heat for too long so you have to let it cool off a bit. Welding on AC will overheat a torch must faster than DC will so be aware when you are welding aluminum that you need to give your torch a break. And have mercy on your machine. Try not to hit the duty cycle wall at high amps on your machine and it will last longer.

Yeah,

It looks like you're using a cup for a standard gas lens.

On some torches when you use only the supplied white insulator for the gas lens it will not allow enough tolerance between the gas lens and the neck of the cup. So when you tighten the cup it creates tension on the cup neck, and maybe that collet too.

Anyway, as the heat increases, voila!

Try using just the old, tapered white insulator. It won't have a flange-like seat and will only allow a few small turns for tightening of the cup, but will probably do fine. You can also use a belt sander to take a little off the standard insulator to get more threads on the cup, but it's not needed.

I have the same machine, I assume you're using the torch that came with it. I'm kind of surprised you could hold onto the torch long enough to do that much damage, you must have been wearing a really heavy glove. The machine has a duty cycle of 25% at 200A, and as others have said, the torch is rated for 150A. So I'd say your results are not surprising, especially walking the cup. The first thing I did was get a gas lens for mine, makes it much easier to learn and improves weld quality. I'd start on something like 1/8" stock so you can keep welding without waiting for the machine to cool down, and at lower currents your torch won't get too hot to hold. I personally don't find walking the cup to be very easy, even though it seems like it should be. So you might just stick with freehanding to see if it's easier for you. If you're really going to be welding 3/8" material a lot, I'd get a water cooled torch.
It's a nice machine for the money. The only thing I don't like is the somewhat harsh starting current, and the inability to adjust pre and post flow.

I am using a 17 torch and one of the first things i bought was a gas lens kit from weldingcity.com. I did have the gas lens on when this happen. I was welding DC at the time with the mild steel.

So would it be safe to say that the lens it self is probably warped and no good? As far as the torch heating up i do have some slightly heavy gloves but i didn't notice a heat difference at the time.

I used the plastic insulator that came with the gas lens kit. Is there a certain tightness for the cup to lens to torch? I had them all pretty snug.

I really appreciate all the info. TIG is a whole different ball game.

centofanti wrote:I am using a 17 torch and one of the first things i bought was a gas lens kit from weldingcity.com. I did have the gas lens on when this happen. I was welding DC at the time with the mild steel.

So would it be safe to say that the lens it self is probably warped and no good? As far as the torch heating up i do have some slightly heavy gloves but i didn't notice a heat difference at the time.

I used the plastic insulator that came with the gas lens kit. Is there a certain tightness for the cup to lens to torch? I had them all pretty snug.

I really appreciate all the info. TIG is a whole different ball game.

You don't need your cup all that tight, just snug. If you can get a tungsten through your gas lens then it is still good.Your collet looks a little smoked but that could just be the picture. I don't use that extra insulator that everyone makes all the fuss about and never had an air contamination problem but some guys have to have it but if you use it you don't have blow your eyeballs out of the sockets threading your cup on...just snug.

Second what others have said. I'd also add that walking the cup is a light touch. If it's something that you're not used to, you might have a tendency to grab tight and walk it super hard which isn't good for the weld or the torch.

A good way to learn is to take a piece of metal or something and draw a line with some soap stone and just practice walking the line without even turning on the machine. This will help you to walk straight but also see that you have momentum. I'm not talking 5 minutes but maybe an hour or two a day for a week or two. After you 'get it' you'll never go back to free hand unless you have to.

Good luck

I have broken multiple cups looking like that depending on what I am doing, I did an anodized aluminum diamond plate floor, welding 2 8 ft seams I went through 4 or 5 cups, some 6,7 & 8's. It was horrible but it seemed that the hotter they got, the easier it was to break them.

I would just touch the floor with the cup and boom, the reduced part would just break off. Like a light tap, not dropping it but just touching the floor and it broke off. Drove me nuts, went to a 1/2" cup without the reducing section and it stayed together.

Too many amps for the torch does'nt help but most of us do it when needed & the only times I see breakage like that is when your missing the second insulator - the usual one supplied with a gas lens is used AS WELL AS the standard one - you can get a single piece & this is mentioned in several previous threads - I believe Oscar was kind enough to find a picture & part number for it - certainly CK list it - the collet is a result of heat & likely tightened a bit much - it's not as bad as some as it's not twisted that bad - easy solution is use a wedge collet - I don't see why you should'nt walk the cup while learning - some find it easy to pick up though it obviously puts more heat into the torch - I tend only to do it on root runs that are feathered so the amps won't need to be that high.

noddybrian wrote: - easy solution is use a wedge collet -

...or don't re-righten when hot. That will certainly make em twist. Then bulge, to a degree when they will restrict argon flow. Good brands are not as sensitive as cheap Chinese stuff.