Welding Tips and Tricks

Have been practicing on some stainless sheet to get good gas coverage and reduce heat input.
I have never been able to get that blue or gold color on my welds before so I decided to try to get there.

Sheet is 1,5 mm (16-17 gauge)
Filler used on all pictures, 1,6mm (1/16") 316
1,6mm 2% Thoriated tungsten, pointed
0,5s pre flow
1s up-slope
50 Amps
1,5s downslope
7s post gas
Regulator set to 7 l/min (15 cfh) but not measured.
#12 cup on a WP26 torch with a standard colletbody, 1 layer of 3M scotch brite in the cup

Did some runs with a #7 cup first without scotch brite and the welds turned out grey and dull as I'm used to.

T-joint Backside, just some sugaring on one spot Butt welded, could have used more current here. Didnt fused 100% on backside Outside corner Increased gas flow to 8 l/min on this run Looks like I'm on right track but what do you say I should change to improve?
Is the heatband ok or should I aim for even smaller?
Welds have only been wiped with my glove after they cooled.

I don't see you actively trapping argon, so just FYI, from best-to-worst when it comes to "preserving" the argon before it dissipates:

• Acute (<90°) inside corner joint
• T-joint (90° fillet)
• Obtuse (180° < Θ < 90°) inside corner joint
• flat butt weld
• outside corner joint.
• similarly with round tubing, the smaller the radius of curvature (smaller diameter tubing) the worse the argon coverage will be

Unless you proactively wick heat out, and/or prolong the argon gas coverage, you aren't doing anything to actually achieve your goal. Wicking the heat out takes the most work, but is free after you set up your "jigs". Prolonging and/or increasing the argon cloud size will take more $$$ out of your wallet, but is less work for you.

I weld 16g every day with a gas lens, #7 cup, 1/16" tung and 45-55 amps...depending on joint configuration, 15-20cfh.

The thing with stainless is get in and get out quick, with that 1.6 filler your beads actually look a little cold and convex more then I'd expect.

How did you prep the plates? Looks like you didn't scotch brite them at all. Did you wipe with acetone? What angle is your torch at? You shouldn't have a problem with color with a 7 cup. Try a 7 with a gas lens. Also post a pics of your torch angle if you could.

Oscar wrote:I don't see you actively trapping argon, so just FYI, from best-to-worst when it comes to "preserving" the argon before it dissipates:

• Acute (<90°) inside corner joint
• T-joint (90° fillet)
• Obtuse (180° < Θ < 90°) inside corner joint
• flat butt weld
• outside corner joint.
• similarly with round tubing, the smaller the radius of curvature (smaller diameter tubing) the worse the argon coverage will be

Unless you proactively wick heat out, and/or prolong the argon gas coverage, you aren't doing anything to actually achieve your goal. Wicking the heat out takes the most work, but is free after you set up your "jigs". Prolonging and/or increasing the argon cloud size will take more $$$ out of your wallet, but is less work for you.

Oscar...........you bring up an interesting topic. Can you elaborate on the "wicking" you posted about!!!

rahtreelimbs wrote:

Oscar wrote:I don't see you actively trapping argon, so just FYI, from best-to-worst when it comes to "preserving" the argon before it dissipates:

• Acute (<90°) inside corner joint
• T-joint (90° fillet)
• Obtuse (180° < Θ < 90°) inside corner joint
• flat butt weld
• outside corner joint.
• similarly with round tubing, the smaller the radius of curvature (smaller diameter tubing) the worse the argon coverage will be

Unless you proactively wick heat out, and/or prolong the argon gas coverage, you aren't doing anything to actually achieve your goal. Wicking the heat out takes the most work, but is free after you set up your "jigs". Prolonging and/or increasing the argon cloud size will take more $$$ out of your wallet, but is less work for you.

Oscar...........you bring up an interesting topic. Can you elaborate on the "wicking" you posted about!!!

it is because the base metal/weld bead is still hot enough that it oxidizes as soon as the argon coverage is stopped/dissipates. Minimizing the heat input by way of proper technique is #1. Not saying I'm an expert, but having done stainless before, it is easy to see how it is beneficial. If you wick the heat out using copper backing plates, discoloration can be minimized because the bead will cool faster after welding has taken place. Aside from silver, copper has the highest thermal conductivity and heat capacity of all metals. Therefore, it alleviates one aspect of discoloration. The other aspects which come from proper technique still need to be perfected, as not everything can be backed up with appropriate copper plates. In the end it all comes down to how hot the metal is when there is no more argon to protect it from the oxygen in the atmosphere. With tubing, back-purging not only protects the backside of the bead, but also wicks some heat way as the argon absorbs some of it from the backside. On flat plates, not so easy, but still do able if you setup purge-dams. Many weldors get their desired level of discoloration without doing any of this, but that is after honing their technique after much time and practice to perfect their technique.

you could drive a semi through that nozzle. pony up the money and get a gas lens. not that you eve need one #7 like the man said and yank the scotch brite. must be about a square foot of it in there.

Thanks all, I'll test some more.
I'll try a heat sink.

I have gas lenses for the 9 torch but I wanted the largest cup I could get to maximise coverage. Without the scotch brite it gets dull. Square foot, well you might have small feet, the disc is 19 mm.

Ricks comment is right, it was too cold. I also have problems seeing the bead after its laid. Need to work more there too.

Some of the plates were scotch brited and cleaned, some werent. I couldnt see a difference after.

While a heat sink will help some, proper prep and travel speed are key. Something tells me you might be moving too slow. Moving faster will help keep things cooler as well. When doing stainless in any place it will fit I use a #7 cup and gas lens.

Did some more tries yesterday. Switched to gas lens and #8 cup (9-torch) Gas at 10 cfh
Add a chunk of steel, with a thin copper sheet to avoid sticking, as heat sink under the outside corner.
Using 1mm 316 filler instead of the 1,6mm, moving a lot faster now
Scotch brite and acetone on every piece

Shot of torch angle, try to hold it almost straight up to get some trailing gas The bead is almost proud now, heat band looks smaller but color isnt there yet. Yeah, I slipped and lost the pace at the end... Outside corner Increased gas to 20 cfh here, crap...
I know too much gas can start swirling and suck air in but would this be too much? Argon leak?
I stuck my thumb up the cup and let the gas flow, man did it leak...
Lots of leakage at the back cap. Is the rubber supposed to be bonded to the metal body so the gas is stopped by the o-ring and around the lens?
Maybe it wasnt a good thing to weld that engine block at 150 amps, AC....

Bought a new body today so I'll test some more tomorrow night.

AndersK,
You are showing signs of improvement for sure. Getting that gas leak will be a good thing. However, it looks to me that you are lingering to long in your weld. For 16ga material, or any SS for that matter, you need to get moving (as mentioned already). Looking at your first set of pictures I see the weld is way to hot on the outside corner joints. I don't believe your amperage it to high rather you speed to slow. Try running beads on plate to get a good, faster travel speed so you are not burning up material. This will also improve on your consistency
I look forward to seeing your progress!
-Jonathan

I also see improvement which is good, I agree with j, your lingering around too long, get in and get out...

Gas leaks will really be an issue with stainless, gas coverage is very important to keep the weld looking good.

More practice and you'll get it! I weld stainless everyday so I take it for granted, I can see improvement in my welds today compared to last year...and that is what welding is all about. I never had a gas lens till about a year and a half ago, now its all I use.

And I was thinking I was moving really fast this time

Will make a run without filler to see the difference in appearance. I van move a lot faster then. Im not in the state were I can feed a whole rod thru yet, which of course make me stay longer in some areas. This thin rod is trickier too.

AndersK,

I have solved your problem, look at your picture that contains the torch, DSC_0401[1].jpg (35.2 KiB).

NO TIG FINGER

I believe you are doing a good job troubleshooting, keep the pictures coming.
Wob

Damn, I knew there was something wrong in that picture
Tig finger was in my pocket....

AndersK,

Your welds are improving. For what its worth, the skill in TIG welding results from watching and reading the puddle. If you compare the welds in the photos to what you'd like to achieve, I'd say that the welds are still too grey (too hot), and the individual weld beads (movements) are too big. This can be from using too large a filler rod, dipping too much in at a time etc.

Sometimes when I started TIG I would turn down the amperage setting, thinking that would reduce the heat in the weld. In some cases, it is actually better to turn up the amperage, so you have the capability to form the puddle more quickly and move faster, which results in actually lowering the total heat into the weld. Think, for example, of trying to start a puddle at 25 amps on your material, which would take a long time, but would put a lot of heat into the work piece. Stainless steel does not release heat like aluminum, and so the heat builds up quickly in a SS part and stays there for quite a while. I know great welders who use higher heat levels but move MUCH faster than average, and their welds are silver to gold in color, and look like a stack of dimes.

If you want to experiment with your technique, first try building a puddle without filler and as you get the puddle where you like it, move a couple inches forward, watching the puddle move ahead of your electrode. Try to make the moves even and consistent, and keep the puddle the same width, watching the sides. Until you can do this without thinking about it, it's hard to get consistent results when you add the dipping or lay wire action into your weld. SS permits fusion without adding filler more than aluminum would, so you can do a lap weld with your 16 gauge and fuse them together while watching the puddle for more practice in seeing how the variables you control will interact.

While the color is pretty and some people work to get it, the color of a high quality weld is a silver to light gold, not red or blue. Red or blue indicates that the weld was hotter than optimum, although they are still OK welds. Above the heat range of the rainbow of those colors, comes the dull grey that you are describing. That's WAY too hot, and is why others have repeated that you have to move faster.

Good luck in your progress.

On thin stainless it's hard to get gold or etc. Of course you can put bigger lens and crank up argon flow, but what for?

Getting that silver or gold color in every weld is just waste of argon. Your weld still won't have enough corrosion resistance compared to pickled. Every now and then people say that your weld is overheated when color of the weld is above blue or red... Well those guys should visit at mill and see what hot rolled sheet look alike

It's true that you can "overheat" austenitic grades, but you need to keep those pretty long above 450 degree of Celcius. Then you will end up with sigma phases etc. Which can affect to corrosion resistance trough selective corrosion or intergranular.... But those have nothing to do with colors that appears on weld bead.

Don't get me wrong I don't want to judge this thread. It's always good to improve own skills and learn new things. Learn how stainless behaves for example. Learn to move faster and trying different amps.

Btw did you try pulsed current already? Also make sure you have really clean metal. Sometimes it's even ideal to remove oxides.

Also there is difference between grades and even patches. More inpurities in metal like phosporous, oxygen and sulphur -> more colour. Also alloying elements affect. En 1.4404 and 1.4435 reacts slightly different.

Thank you Mr Moose, some very good advices in your post.
You are spot on in everything you write. I'm welding with a lot more amps now than when I first started with tig. I know fusion welding without filler is a good practise sometimes. I've been fusion welding 1 mm cold rolled at 75 amps, move very fast and absolute 0-gap. The person who I picked that up from was running that thin material at 140 amps! No way I could do that yet.
Seeing the puddle is everything but I tend to struggle finding a good position to both see the result and where I'm going.

On Friday night I replaced my leaking torch head, but to my surprise it didn't improve at all. Tried a lot of different things but weren't getting any better. Only decent looking was with the #12 cup and scotch brite. The observation I did though was that were I finished the bead had a nice silver or golden color, held the torch steady over there whole time while the post gas was flowing. That told me I dont have any air leaking in, gas is pure and so on.

Today I dug out a big chunk of aluminum from my pile to use as heat sink, which seemed to make a big difference.

Some beads on a flat piece at 45 and 50 amps. Can clearly see that the 1,6mm filler is too much making me put too much heat. Butt weld with small gap. Only clamped the piece at the left side so the bead change color at the right when distorsion lifted it from the aluminum. I would need a bigger gap to get full penetration on this piece or run at higher amps. This is probably the best outside corner I made so far Did a go at a lap weld, screwed up in the middle because of a too big tack there.

My 2 cts...It looks like you are trying for the roll of dimes therefore you are lingering. I laywire stainless. I only try for dimes on aluminum. Dimes are cool though.

There is improvement there as well. Honestly, and with no offence meant or applied, I would suggest working on your actual welding technique rather than focusing on the coloring. I still see inconsistent beadwidth and spacing, which is not necessarily bad but can be improved. An additional promising comment is your not "cooking" your welds in those pics.
-Jonathan
P.S. Nice port block.

No offence taken. I appreciate all comments that will help to improve.

I know I move faster than I can handle but any suggestions about the basic welding technique is much appreciated.

I have done laywire too and sometimes it works better but not always.

Marcus ,did try some pulsing too but havent found the right parameters yet. Im trying to focus without pulsing first to avoid too many parameters.

I agree with Markus, don't get 100% caught up in color, it is more important the base metal is melting and the weld is sound.

Like Markus I weld a lot of sanitary piping, rare do I ever have a straw colored weld on my .065" wall tubing but the corrosion resistance has not been compromised, I pickle and polish them out and they are perfectly blended in.

I suggest doing a pad of beads, bead beside bead, this will help you get a solid technique then the other stuff will fall in place.

As far as pulsing it can help but I think your good to skip it for now and learn the basics first, then mix in the technology.FWIW- I use both laywire and dabbing, laywire can be deceiving if you don't understand what the puddle is telling you or if your settings are off. You can have a beautiful weld that has no penetration, by watching it keyhole and dabbing you know the base metals are melted.

You guys has to be the most polite bunch on the internet

That is some very nice examples Rick. Laywire or dipping?
You're right, the crawl before you walk thing I need to work a lot more with the basics to even get close to that.

Need to refill my tank tomorrow, then back to it again

Does this look right?

What colors should you have?