Welding Tips and Tricks

Hello Gentlemen,

I am interested in your opinions regarding the differences of welding Mig or Tig for Stainless Socket Welds on 2" pipe.

I appreciate your opinions and consideration.

that would depend on what was running through that 2" pipe. are you running straight co2 shielded mig or flux-cored spray or short circuit? play it safe, you can't go wrong with tig.

Your first post so welcome to the forum.

I'd go with tig. It's the easy choise. You already have your argon set up, and get a nice quality weld.
For mig, (at least in my case) you'd have to switch gas, wire and perhaps other wear-parts. And then I find it harder to get as nice a weld, as I can with the tig. I might even choose stick before I go for the mig-setup, unless we're talking about 200 welds.

Mick wrote:I'd go with tig. It's the easy choise. You already have your argon set up, and get a nice quality weld.
For mig, (at least in my case) you'd have to switch gas, wire and perhaps other wear-parts. And then I find it harder to get as nice a weld, as I can with the tig. I might even choose stick before I go for the mig-setup, unless we're talking about 200 welds.

Thanks Mick,

I'm thinking in business terms where, If I can make these 200 stainless socket welds 25% faster with mig than tig, then I can make/sell 25% more products, give my welders a 10% raise, my customers a 5% discount and increase profits by 10%. All provided the welds can be done with the same visual quality using mig as tig. Do you think this can be done in your opinion?

I Appreciate your opinion Mick,

Don55

Well, then you just make sure, that the parts has a nice fit, and the welder is fairly skilled, so he can re-position fast with a mig-gun. Changing wire, gas etc. is nothing, when you talk mass production.

If you can do some of the work in a welding-lathe, you might get it done faster, and it takes less skill.

I can't say anything about economy, there's too many variables, but mig was created to get more welds done

Mick wrote:Well, then you just make sure, that the parts has a nice fit, and the welder is fairly skilled, so he can re-position fast with a mig-gun. Changing wire, gas etc. is nothing, when you talk mass production.

If you can do some of the work in a welding-lathe, you might get it done faster, and it takes less skill.

I can't say anything about economy, there's too many variables, but mig was created to get more welds done

Thanks Mick

Socket weld can be done as quickly with TIG as MIG on very small pipe, say under one inch.

Larger sizes, MIG will out-pace it by a rate proportional to the size.

However, I'd suggest developing a WPS for a MIG socket weld. A sheet that says "here's how we've found to do it that works" that applies to all your workers, with destructive- and non-destructive-tests of several welds done that way to prove it works. There's no economy in 30% of the welds failing to do what you need them to do, no matter hhow fast you finished.

A general reminder to all who would do socket welds, regardless of the process: Do NOT bottom the pipe in the socket like when sweating copper. Pull it back 1/16" to 1/8" to allow for the shrinkage of the weld, or you will have the occasional cracked weld failure.

Steve S

Otto Nobedder wrote:Socket weld can be done as quickly with TIG as MIG on very small pipe, say under one inch.

Larger sizes, MIG will out-pace it by a rate proportional to the size.

However, I'd suggest developing a WPS for a MIG socket weld. A sheet that says "here's how we've found to do it that works" that applies to all your workers, with destructive- and non-destructive-tests of several welds done that way to prove it works. There's no economy in 30% of the welds failing to do what you need them to do, no matter hhow fast you finished.

A general reminder to all who would do socket welds, regardless of the process: Do NOT bottom the pipe in the socket like when sweating copper. Pull it back 1/16" to 1/8" to allow for the shrinkage of the weld, or you will have the occasional cracked weld failure.

Steve S

Great advise Steve. It will be implemented.
I appreciate it.
Awesome Motorcycle.

Don55

Otto Nobedder wrote: However, I'd suggest developing a WPS for a MIG socket weld.

Steve S

You are absolutely right. A WPS can save a lot of wasted time and failures. As a welder/fabricator I like to try different settings and procedures. It's just more fun. But you can't argue with a tried an tested WPS, that just gets people working right away.