Welding Tips and Tricks

I started collecting parts to make this nearly 30 years ago and I finally took the time to finish it.

I had to buy one of the diverter valves but the rest is all recycled parts from work.

It has the flow meter in line after the solenoid of the machine which saves an incredible amount of gas.

I mounted the water cooler on a shelf above it and ran short hoses to it. All the Argon lines are SS tubing except for short Synflex lines to the regulator and the selector box.

Seems to work good so far.

Len


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Looks good Len...

Braehill wrote: It has the flow meter in line after the solenoid of the machine which saves an incredible amount of gas.

Seems to work good so far.

Len
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Len I don't quite follow why this saves gas, can you provide more info?

Thanks

Also curious about the incredible amount of gas saved explanation?

my guess is that it cuts down on the surge flow that happens right after the solenoid initially opens up. Since the solenoid is usually after the flowmeter, the hose gets a healthy volume of gas that gets expelled immediately and unnecessarily.

Sorry fellows, storms shut the plant down and had to catch up on some maint. while it was down.

Oscar explained it pretty well. We had a post quite awhile ago on the subject (Zank, I think) and I had my welder set up that way for about a year and there is a noticeable difference in gas losses. Your solenoid is backing up 50# of pressure and when it opens all that gas is expelled unrestricted. If you put the flow meter after the solenoid it is expelled at whatever rate you have your flow meter set.

Is it worth buying extra flow meters and regulators, I'm not sure but I hear people say that they're paying upwards a hundred dollars for Argon, that makes it worth looking into. I have all this stuff on hand at work and can recycle the old ones so there's no cost for me. I have miles of tubing and a bunch of flow meters that was removed during an upgrade here that would normally just be pitched.

My contraption has nothing to do with the gas savings other than how I plumbed the flow meter down line of the solenoid, just convenient to have it all in one place. I also added the CK twist-lock (Tweco) connections to my torches so I can switch the leads from one to the other, now those I had to buy at about $40 apiece. A switch to toggle between torches would be quite expensive and I really didn't see it being worth the extra money when the twist-locks are a 10 second ordeal to change.

Len

len
the flow meter down stream is a good idea and
besides the dollar saving less times lugging
tanks around to be filled. one of my least
favorite things to do. I'm sold on the idea
craig

Braehill
that makes sense with/when parts available at low cost. Like cubic inches in racing every little bit helps.

And if one would get crazy serious on gas saving, mount the sol/flow meter at/on the torch.

Rick,
If you think about it, it's not that crazy, it's called an air cooled torch with a valve. I use one most of the time for scratch start and as I age I find myself trying to save gas by forgetting to turn it on before I strike an arc. The good news is I get a clean tungsten when I have to go sharpen it back up after I smoke it.

I did envision your idea with all that mounted at the torch, but I can't see myself Tig welding with what looks like a spool gun.

Len

1st thing I usually forget is turn the gas on at the tank,same results , shiny tungsten when through grinding.
still like your example/pictures