Welding Tips and Tricks

Little Star Trek reference...
We've a new employee. I'm sharing my welder.
I sat down to do a job and there's a green electrode in the torch. Inverter machine.
WTF I thought then Googled it. Won't hurt anything, but should I lay law down?
I don't need thoriated in my shop and stated that to him.

What do you think?

He might see this as he said he saw some of Jody's videos. Says he has a $5000 red machine at home.

pure tungsten is for transformer machines, not used on inverter machines.
i'm guessing he has a transformer machine at home. he should know the differences between tungsten's.
lay the law down. time to brush up on tungsten specs and that you don't screw with other peoples machines.

Can I say a word about tools with wings? My gosh it's bad where I work.

nelson wrote: ↑Thu May 19, 2022 8:13 pm Can I say a word about tools with wings? My gosh it's bad where I work.

security cameras inside the shop.
put it on display in the lunch room.

I don't use any green tungsten because my welder manual says not to. But, is it really going to harm the machine? I would just think it'll wear much faster and that's about it. Somewhere here I have green ones I'd give to anyone who'd want em. They're terrible, even in a transformer machine.

My experience with green (pure) tung in a dynasty 400 is that it won't strike a arc to save it's life. Took about 6+ pedal romps and clicks etc to get a burst of a arc to start.

Pulled my hair in that one till I realised all the 1/16 tungsten I had was pure only.

Tweake. Good idea. No timeclock, and maybe 2 people have the same hours in the shop.
Good idea about the camera, but also, where the monitor is. We never thought about that. Some new people are "swinging time". A term I got from truckers calling from my office telling their dispatchers the are calling from their Last Stop.
Can I vent? I take 10 tungsters, grind them, put them back, point down, in the blue & clear holder. When i dip them and replace, (I'm not the greatest welder) I put them back in, point up, so i have a clue.I don't throw them in a box, the floor, or some elsewhere I'm yet to discover.

the good habits you learn when you have to pay for it all.

like one of our work utes that i am currently fixing due to damage done by an employee (who no longer works here).

BTW. Green is not thoriated. It's pure tungsten. It won't hurt the machine-but it's not fun to weld with. Green tungsten likes to form a large round ball on the tip. That negates the advantages of an inverter welder.

Yeah, I know. Thorium belongs in cathodes on vacuum tubes, sealed up behind glass, not red hot on my tungsten inches away from my nose.
I told the guy, No Red. We'll see if English works here. Stay tuned.

Haha I’ll hold thoriated tungsten between my lips like one would a toothpick if I have to sharpen a few. In fact I did once use thoriated tungsten as a tooth pick. It really isn’t that radioactive. Radioactivity is in a lot of things when you seriously look into various metallurgy subjects.

If you want to read something interesting google search low background steel. Fascinating subject that 99% of people never think about.

Like many things, the red (thoriated), tungsten in it's 'solid' form is not a problem from a radiation standpoint. It's quite low dosage as the actual thorium content is of course limited.

It's when you start grinding them and the dust gets into the air and that slowly works it's way into your lungs that the problems can start to occur.. Not a problem for the once-ever-so-often user, but it used to be a problem for guys who had to do this day in and day out at their workplace(s).

And as technology moves on there's other, potentially less harmful, alternatives. And in several cases better performing too for certain applications..

Similar to why some chemicals like solvents have been banned or highly restricted for use over time. In many cases incidental exposure (eg. to something like Toluene which is now classed as 'very bad' for good reason, but used to be in nearly all marker pens..) is not going to do much to your health, but get exposed to it at a regular basis and there is a siginifcant health risk.

Also don't underestimate the stupidity of people when it comes to ignoring warnings, which also leads to products being taken out of general circulation just to stop 'stupid' from harming themselves...

Bye, Arno.

Like how every bag of peanuts has a “may contain traces of nuts” warning on it.