Welding Tips and Tricks

I've been doing a fair amount of TIG welding on thin mild steel and aluminum and little bit of SilB brazing of mild steel with silicon brazing rod but I cannot get a nice clean shiny bead with the silicon bronze. It always appears sooty color.
details: 2% lanthanated, DC current, 5-7 litres of argon, no. 6 cup, different voltages tried, 19 gauge sheet metal.
I'm just wondering if I am melting the base metal. If so, how do I tell if its too hot ?
Just wondering where to go from here.

31fords wrote:I've been doing a fair amount of TIG welding on thin mild steel and aluminum and little bit of SilB brazing of mild steel with silicon brazing rod but I cannot get a nice clean shiny bead with the silicon bronze. It always appears sooty color.
details: 2% lanthanated, DC current, 5-7 litres of argon, no. 6 cup, different voltages tried, 19 gauge sheet metal.
I'm just wondering if I am melting the base metal. If so, how do I tell if its too hot ?
Just wondering where to go from here.

1. A picture might help.
2. To see if you are melting in, run the bead without silicon bronze and if you melt the base metal with those settings then reduce your amperage and continue until you don't have an issue. Play with the foot pedal to and don't be afraid to back off a little. 19 gauge sheet metal aint that thick.

31fords wrote:I've been doing a fair amount of TIG welding on thin mild steel and aluminum and little bit of SilB brazing of mild steel with silicon brazing rod but I cannot get a nice clean shiny bead with the silicon bronze. It always appears sooty color.
details: 2% lanthanated, DC current, 5-7 litres of argon, no. 6 cup, different voltages tried, 19 gauge sheet metal.
I'm just wondering if I am melting the base metal. If so, how do I tell if its too hot ?
Just wondering where to go from here.

Brazing is a bit tricky. You need to set your amperage so that you melt the Silbr before your base metal. On thin metal it's even more tricky because it doesn't take alot of amps to melt in to begin with. You are probably likely including your base metal. Turn your amps way down, to a point where you would have to wait a second or two to puddle the base. Get your rod under the arc to get a puddle going and then move forward. Remember, you aren't puddling the base metal, you are concentrating on the Silbr. You need to heat the base but you need to melt the rod. That's the trick. In my experience with Silbr, I never get it super shiny bright but it usually looks good. That may have something to do with DC. You can also weld it on AC but I never have. Jody has a video out when he was making piggy-banks and using Silbr. He explains it way better than I ever could. Good luck.

I think this may be the video you're thinking of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?annotatio ... 6ccw7X8zeI

There's also a Part 2 vid of the "pig weld", but I think this is the one with the most SiBr work.

Try using AC. It works more like oxy-acetylene brazing / silver soldering, as the HF cleaning action acts like a flux and allows the bronze to flow. Start with the AC balance where you use it for aluminum.

You'll find it's far easier to keep the base metal below its melting point.