[Tommy2069]

ok as i posted before i have this old miller dialarc in my shop. it tigs everything but aluminum perctly. it burns a 1/8 7018 so smooth its unreal but yet when i try tigging aluminum it's all over the place. the aluminum is clean so i know thats not the problem i tried the red and green tip gunsten with same results. what it is doing is it's very hard to get the puddle going infact it's impossible to get the puddle started. now if i try just running weld on flat plate it will work fine but as for starting a weld or keeping a wedl going on butted up plate it;s a no go. now i'm not a tig welder i know just enough to get by i'm pretty good with stainless and carbon steel but this aluminum is killing me.i have my own shop and i have been welding for over 30+ years. there is no foot pedal on the machine so all of the steel starts are scratch starts. the high frequency does great for starting on aluminum without haveing to touch the tungsten on the metal but it seems to fizz out. i have reversed the leads back and forth so many times it's crazy now i have a new alph tig coming but thats about 3 to 4 weeks away but i would still like to figure out what im doing wrong or if it's the machine.i can try to make a video of what it's doing if possible.

[Farmwelding]

So scratch start tig rig eh. Can't do aluminum. It won't tig weld on AC current making you not able to tig aluminum.

[Tommy2069]

i use the scratch start on stainless and mild steel as for aluminum i set it on a/c with high frequency on i tried with high frequency on start and on constantly but end up with the same results it seems the machine will weld fine then it goes haywire.got a alph 200 coming soon but i really wanted to figure this machine out because it welds everything else nice and smooth. i do know that the switch to reverse polarity is wired backwards because if i put it on straight polarity it's reversed but if i switch it to reversed it's striaght polarity. we bought this machine at a county auction in hancock miss. we only paid 100.00 for it and it had a sticker on it that said it shocks we got it to the shop and hooked it up . i hooked the ground clamp to the work table and picked up the lead now here comes the wierd part i was about 2ft from the table i was completly dry i held the eloctrode holder in my hand with a rod in the other when i got the rod within a inch or two from the holder a arc jumped from the holder to the rod and litterally blew it out my hand .we sent the machine out to get checked and the repairman said it had a leaking capacitor when we got it back i was scared to try it again but i did and it welded great. now the only problem is the aluminum tig welding it just fizzes out.might just have to leave it as a stick welder and go at that.

[Farmwelding]

Hold on. How does your stick welder have high freq start. I am really confused since I never new that was a possibility.

[Vicicondi]

I have a Campbell hausfeld pro 140 mig welder. Looking for a compatible spool gun

[Tommy2069]

it's a miller dialarc hf. i'm new to tig welding the last time i messed around with tig was back in the mid 90's so when it comes to tig i'm a newb.as for the stick welding i just put the machine on dc and turn the high frequency on start setting thats about all i know.lol.when i do have it on hf start the arc does start fast with the stick electrode i don't know if it is supose to be able to weld stick with the hf on or not but it does. if it's not supose to then i guess that is just another thing wierd about the machine. but i have never used a machine before that burned stick this smooth. i got two lincoln sa 200's a miller bobcat 250 now both of them burn pretty smooth but they don't come close to the quality of stick welding that the dialarc has.it burns aluminum with the 30a spoolgun really smooth too it just won't tig aluminum very good.

[GreinTime]

it's a miller dialarc hf. i'm new to tig welding the last time i messed around with tig was back in the mid 90's so when it comes to tig i'm a newb.as for the stick welding i just put the machine on dc and turn the high frequency on start setting thats about all i know.lol.when i do have it on hf start the arc does start fast with the stick electrode i don't know if it is supose to be able to weld stick with the hf on or not but it does. if it's not supose to then i guess that is just another thing wierd about the machine. but i have never used a machine before that burned stick this smooth. i got two lincoln sa 200's a miller bobcat 250 now both of them burn pretty smooth but they don't come close to the quality of stick welding that the dialarc has.it burns aluminum with the 30a spoolgun really smooth too it just won't tig aluminum very good.

I learned how to TIG weld on a Dialarc HF! It'll hammer down on aluminum. Farm, a Dialarc is a predecessor to a Syncrowave.

Can you, I guess, get more specific on what it's doing? I didn't think that it was life with HF all the time if you didn't have a contactor, but I could be wrong about that. I'll ask my dad, or unplug the MIC-4 and see if it will light up on AC TIG

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

[Coldman]

I believe the Dialarc is a pure sine wave power source which means it requires full time HF superimposed to maintain the arc. Without the HF, the arc will snuff out as soon as the sine curves passes zero volts on its cycle.
Be aware that full time HF can create zapping problems. Here is a link to previous posts which discusses it and give good earthing diagrams.
http://forum.weldingtipsandtricks.com/v ... F+earthing

[Tommy2069]

yea it does zap you i got zapped the otherday i put my elbo on the table and she bit me good.not nearly as bad as what happened putting the rod in the whip .

[Skylineauto]

What gas are you using? flow rate? is the gas hose clear with out restrictions? The high frequency contacts may need to be cleaned and adjusted. I know with my older miller the arc could be very unstable at times. A simple tune up helped out big time.

I you dont already have a copy of the manual you can find one here.
https://www.millerwelds.com/support/manuals-and-parts

[poodle]

Had a Dialarc set-up like yours back in the 80's. Never had a problem with it welding aluminum. We used green tungsten and it would weld smooth. Have a Longevity 200DX now and I sure like having a foot pedal.

[Tommy2069]

hose is good flow rate is in between 15cfs to 20 at the most no wind or breeze.