Welding Tips and Tricks

I had a MIG welder refuse to perform Tuesday. It could not be set within any range I was familiar with, refused to penetrate, and generally was worthless.

This was .035 308SS, at 20.2V and 345 IPM, using Tri-Mix (90% He, 7.5% Ar, 2.5% CO2)

I could blame the machine, but I'd seen this before... I'd done it by mistake once before, sooo

Here's the "weld" produced by the bad-gas bottle: Here's the weld, same machine, same settings, with another bottle of Tri-Mix known to be good: Bad/contaminated/mislabled gas happens...

Steve S

It sure does. I get emails all the time. New bottle of Argon on Tig welder sparking like crazy with brown haze. Swap back to old bottle or known argon and problem goes away. Label said argon but it's 75/25 or contaminated gas. And of course the LWS guy argues and rolls eyes.

Jody


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I think it would be a good idea if gas suppliers would get a multi process machine or a couple different machines to be able to see what it's doing on a particular process. Or do they have a way to test what the makeup of the gas is?

I know that this happens and it's always a kick in the pants when it happens to you, but with the price of cover gas through the roof already, if they have to analyze every cylinder, your price may well double. Every company is out here trying to do more with less and it shows in quality control as well as other places.

With that said, most places I know should replace a suspect bottle without too much greif, especially if you deal with them on a regular basis.

Industrial Argon is held to a standard for purity and moisture level, but mixes, unless they come with a Certificate of Conformance, are a crap shoot. They are run through a gas mixer and rarely analyzed when finished. The more parts to your mix, the less chance you'll have of it being analyzed. Reason being is an analyzer for each different component of the mix costs tens of thousands of dollars to produce accurate results, and your local welding store can't justify it.

Most welders are not going to be able to pick up the difference between 8% CO2 and 15% and so forth. We have had the discussion here many times on the moisture problem and it also adds elements to your mixed gases that don't need to be there.

If you are doing critical welds you can ask for Ultra High Purity, with a Certificate of Analysis. You can expect to pay quite a bit more for the cylinder but sometimes it a lot cheaper than fixing the damage of bad gas.

Not an excuse, just the facts of life, cost is king.

Len

Do you guys find it hard to finally blame the gas....I'm always be thinking of every other issue first..lol

I had the same thing on some trimix last week, new guy was welding so I chocked it up to his inexperience then I went to use it an did no better ...swap bottles and Viola

I just installed an all stainless tubing and flex hose to my system not long ago and only had about #500 in my Argon bottle when I went to try it out. Welded like crap so I figured that the bottle had moisture so I switched it out for a Ultra High Purity one. Same crap. Leak checked every component even as far as pulling a vacuum, everything was fine. Put it back together and then I started noticing what looked like smoke in my flow meter. Took it apart and found out that the tubing I used had a Mud Wasp's nest in it and I sent it through the flow meter. I'm not sure what to call that gas mixure of 97% Argon/2% mud/1% larva.

Len

Lmfao......Now thats something you don't hear everyday...

mositure dryer/ filter
I use these, they will change color, easy install

http://www.amazon.com/Arrow-Pneumatic-P ... B003BJN0UO

won't fix bad gas mix, but eliminate mositure possibility

I have my regulator at the bottle then a desiccant filter, then stainless tubing to the solenoid valve, then the flow meter. No wasted gas and hopefully no moisture, just mud and larvae.


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Argo-Buzz 52. . . Has a real sting to it.

Mick

Rick_H wrote:Do you guys find it hard to finally blame the gas....I'm always be thinking of every other issue first..lol...

Nope. When I have an issue, it's one of two situations...

I just changed the bottle, and did not change a single setting, and it goes to crap... GAS!

Someone else changed the bottle and I'm the next guy to use it. Welds like crap on familiar settings. Check ground end-to-end. Check (for MIG) that the whip is firmly seated and not drawing air. Change bottles.

I have NO problem suspecting the gas first, as I'm very familiar with how each machine performs when everything is right. I only weld with gas at work, so I always have another bottle I can swap in (and I don't grab a fresh bottle to test... I grab one from a machine that's performing like it should so the gas is "proven"... If you have one bad bottle, you could have five.) and get a difinitive answer.

BTW, I think my "bad bottle" was pure nitrogen. I've MIGged stainless with pure argon by mistake once, and it "could" be made to perform in the flat position. Aparrently, our LWS uses the same color bottles for nitrogen, as we accidentally got a bottle in that color combo that was clearly labeled "compressed nitrogen".

Go figure...

Steve S

Great example and thanks for posting with pictures

I am waiting for this to happen to me, every time I go exchange a bottle the LWS swaps me my empty bottle for another empty bottle. Our LWS is an hour one way and after driving home twice with an empty bottle I have them gauge it at the loading dock. I went to another branch of the same gas supplier and ask the old guy to gauge it and he flew into me and said if that bottle is empty you let me know and I will personally kick the guys butt!!! Come to find out they fill the bottles at that branch. I haven't got an empty yet but just waiting for a bad one.

We have pressure gauges on the bottles now so you can easily see if the bottle is full or not before leaving the yard

AndersK wrote:We have pressure gauges on the bottles now so you can easily see if the bottle is full or not before leaving the yard

Talking about these?

@Markus,
The Genie cylinders are very nice but are still being filled in a trans-fill situation so there is still a chance to get either a mislabeled cylinder or the introduction of moisture. The built in gauge is a nice feature though, I didn't realize they had that feature and the regulator being protected in between the handles is smart. I'm not sure if they're available here yet or not.

Len

Markus wrote:

AndersK wrote:We have pressure gauges on the bottles now so you can easily see if the bottle is full or not before leaving the yard

Talking about these?

Interesting, I'd never seen them before.

http://youtu.be/cg-toskemnc

Dont put them on your TIG, thats propane

Here's my bottle

For bottles with integrated regulators, I've seen these in use, although I haven't used myself.
One trailer manufacturing operator stated that they were a great way to go. Just quick-connect the gas line from the MIG and you're ready.

AndersK wrote:Dont put them on your TIG, thats propane

The video I watched showed 300 bar tanks and had digital read outs saying what gas was in them.
300 bar is definitely not propane pressures.
I have never seen any of these of course, so I'm just going by the video.

The Genie looks great 4350psi, smaller and lighter, I want 3!!! Argon,CO2 & Helium.... wonder how much?

But I wonder about CO2, are the tanks filled with gas under pressure or in liquid form by weight?

MinnesotaDave wrote:

AndersK wrote:Dont put them on your TIG, thats propane

The video I watched showed 300 bar tanks and had digital read outs saying what gas was in them.
300 bar is definitely not propane pressures.
I have never seen any of these of course, so I'm just going by the video.

Youre right about that.
Was just a little ribbing from my side, the argon tanks has a green ribbon.

Two guys tried to fill a propane tank here with vehicle bio-gas a while ago. They learned , or rather the one that survived, that 200 bar is not what a propane tank is rated for.

Swedes

Yup Genie serie bottles are avaible in sizes of 10 and 20 litres with 300 bar.

Gases avaible for Genie series at the moment, here in Finland:
- Argon
- Nitrogen
- Argon mixes for Mag-welding
- Nitrogen/hydrogen mix for root protection on stainless.

We haven't tested those yet, but I think that those bottles would be more than ideal to be used in pharmaceutical factrories or so.