Welding Tips and Tricks

I broke the bracket that holds the arm rest on my wheelchair. I thought it was aluminum but it produced faint orange sparks when I ground it out. I used 4043 filler but once a puddle formed, it became so incredibly bright I had to set my helmet shade on maximum. Seemed to weld ok and hasn't broken yet. Any of y'all know what material I'm dealing with?
Thanks.
Eldon

Magnesium maybe? Don't know that it would take 4043 at all. I wouldn't think so though. I have had aluminum throw the occasional orange spark but it was more from the grinding wheel than the metal.

If it produced any spark it's likely only to be ferrous of some type. Certainly not magnesium in my view.

Dull orange sparks can sometimes indicate HS steel, but that is unlikely to be the case in this construction.

But they can also indicate some Stainless Steel types. Could it be Stainless?

Is it attracted to a magnet - bearing in mind there are Austenitic (non-magnetic) and Martensitic SS types - amongst others.

Austenitic is most common, and will probably weld (not well though) with 4043.

Don't have a simple answer without seeing it personally are feeling it. I never had aluminum give off sparks on grinder or magnesium either. They just produced shavings.well except once when I didn't clean all mag particles out of grinder housing. Next time I ground piece of steel it ignited all the mag shavings

Maybe these links will help you

http://www.scrapmetaljunkie.com/241/the ... g-metals-2

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7PWCh6fdXdw

Thanks for all the replies. The part feels really light like aluminum. The thing that confuses me is the sparks. I thought it might have been contamination on my stone so I put a new one on and it still threw the orange sparks. It did flow nicely with the 4043 filler and seems so be holding well but I'm going to order a new bracket anyway.

Cheers.
-Eldon

Just a guess...

Titanium, maybe?

-Bear

Take note, he got it welded with alum filler. If were anything too exotic, it would not have welded. Plus Ti would have yielded bright white sparks.

weldin mike 27 wrote:Take note, he got it welded with alum filler. If were anything too exotic, it would not have welded. Plus Ti would have yielded bright white sparks.

Any guesses Mike? Could the sparks have come from other contamination in the grinding wheel? I was presuming it might have just welded by fusing the parent metal.

I suspected contamination on the stone was responsible for the sparks so i tried a new flap disk as well as a scotch-brite wheel and got the same sparks. It was just a curiosity to me but even though i got it welded and it's holding, I'm ordering a new bracket. I guess I should go on a diet so I don't break it again.
Cheers.
-Eldon

I'm only guessing, but according to what Jody has said, it might be an al magnesium alloy. If it was more magnesium, it would have cracked straight away from the AL filler wire.

My guess would be a 7000 series aluminum.

Eldon,
I'm no metallurgist for sure but seeing that the name on the wheelchair in the picture says Top End Crossfire T6 Titanium, I would guess Titanium. Now I know everything on your chair isn't Titanium, but I would think that the structural parts would be judging by the name.

Len

The frame is titanium. Not sure about the bolt on pieces.

Ti has bright white sparks, and would have had a hissy fit if you tried to weld it with 4043.

weldin mike 27 wrote:Ti has bright white sparks, and would have had a hissy fit if you tried to weld it with 4043.

I'm not trying to be argumentative... and no offense intended...

I know very little about welding titanium, with 4043 or anything else, so you are probably correct about that, but I have done a LOT of hand blending on titanium jet engine cases and many of them do throw orange or yellow sparks. Others throw bright white sparks...

-Bear

No problem. I thought it was a a general rule of bright white. Thanks for the info