Welding Tips and Tricks

G'day from downunder you blokes.

I'm building a couple of sheds on my farm and thought you might be interested. I'm a self taught welder, having grown up welding on a 180amp 240v copper core arc welder. I used it to build all sorts of things, ultimately a lovely tandem car trailer to move my show cars around.

And then the wife bought me a Mig! And life changed. No ore cleaning up slag. The wire brush retailers all miss me now and she's not plucking bits of wire out of my clothes!

The two sheds are 10mx 9m and 32m x 17m in size. That's about 1000 sq/ft and 5500 sq/ft for you Americans. I designed the sheds myself, had the drawings certified by an engineer and then went and purchased about 13 metric tons of steel to build the frames.

I started on the small shed frames which were fabricated from 50x150x5mm rolled hollow section steel (RHS) with the purlin and girt cleats out of mostly 75x10 and 75x8mm flat steel.

The 240v 250amp inverter Mig did a beautiful job on all of this material but I was running at mostly full whack so that left me bothered when I started looking at the big shed and the size of that material.

So I went and purchased a 15 year oldWIA copper core 335amp 415v Mig from a defunct manufacturing company. I fully serviced it, new bezel, tips etc and started to learn the tips and tricks to the more powerful welder.

I built a sturdy girder trolley to allow me to handle the 8.6m long rafters. Here's a shot of the girder trolley and the two Mig machines.

G'day there are about a dozen Aussies here already, My self included. More the merrier as they say. Looking forward to your stories, that's a fairly decent amount of work you have lined up.

Thanks Mike.

I'll throw up a few pictures so you blokes get an idea of what I'm building.

Here's the formwork coming together for the two shed slabs. It took me most of a year to excavate, prepare the area, stone compacted base, steel reinforcing, formwork, boxing etc. All on my own.

Once the concrete was done, then it was time to order the steel.

250UB32 for the columns and rafters, and 50x150x5 RHS fr the smaller shed.

After deliberating for about five minutes, I made the executive decision to prepare individual CAD drawings of each separate component and send them off to a plasma cutter to create. Two weeks later, 2 1/2 ton and 1003 components arrived.

Also another 7 ton and 1300 lineal meters of purlins and girts arrived.

So I made a start. First by getting used to the welder, and materials and made up 156 cleats and brackets. Then I got onto the columns and rafters for the small shed. The wife (Suzie) did all of the primer paint and then I sprayed a nice hammertone top coat onto the finished frames.

Time to erect the small shed frames.

Made up a 2m jib to extend the forklift from 4.5m to 6.5m which allowed me to bolt up the components on the big slab and then carry them over the road to the small slab and sit them down in position.

Suzie helping out and a pile of 5.1m 250UB32 for the columns.

So now I'm nearly ready to start on the big shed. Just working my way up to it. I've never welded anything this big before and it is a bit daunting for a first timer. Hence I'm here, scrounging around for tips and tricks to hold plates, stop things from heat warping etc.

You've taken on a huge personal project, kudos. Looking good and you have heaps of equipment at your disposal.

A couple of things to consider:
- have you removed mill scale from steel prior to mig welding?

- have you cut up a sample weld for macro inspection to confirm your procedure is resulting in good penetration (strength of weld)?

- what are the risks of keeping a large origin lpg cylinder in close proximity to mig welding operations?

Food for thought. Thanks for posting.


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That's what I call a personal project

Looking good indeed.

Do you need to weld under code for structural in Oz?

Coldman wrote:You've taken on a huge personal project, kudos. Looking good and you have heaps of equipment at your disposal.

A couple of things to consider:
- have you removed mill scale from steel prior to mig welding?

- have you cut up a sample weld for macro inspection to confirm your procedure is resulting in good penetration (strength of weld)?

- what are the risks of keeping a large origin lpg cylinder in close proximity to mig welding operations?

Food for thought. Thanks for posting.


Sent using Tapatalk

Thanks for the input.

Yes, mill scale removed and welding area surface ground prior to welding.

Yes, did a penetration exmination on a but welded 10mm to 10mm cleat using my welding settings 3/1/4.5 and all looked good.

Yes, bottle is empty and waiting for a replacement. It's my heater and it's been a bit fresh here.

Great looking set up. Lots of us, myself included have the wish to do things like this, but I lack money and gumption to do it. You seem to have those areas sorted. I whole heartedly agree with the cad profile cutting. Trying to drill and cut all that stuff is a nightmare. What are you going to put in those sheds?

weldin mike 27 wrote:Great looking set up. Lots of us, myself included have the wish to do things like this, but I lack money and gumption to do it. You seem to have those areas sorted. I whole heartedly agree with the cad profile cutting. Trying to drill and cut all that stuff is a nightmare. What are you going to put in those sheds?

Got a few cars and just love making stuff so a bloke needs a bit of space.

Absolutely. I really want a bigger shed. With reliable and lighting. And maybe a ac dc tig, and a lathe and.....

"just love making stuff so a bloke needs a bit of space"

Amen to that brother

I got a 80x40' built a few years back... only ever got to store cars and wood in it because now after fighting with the banks and current economic property climate we have given up on building a house on our 10ac block.
Have brought a established place with about 7 sheds(ranging from a 20x25' up to a 80x30') and two houses one of them being a B&B all on 16ac!

Excellent - love big buildings to work in....now if only a had a big building....

Oh well, I make do with about 30' x 32'

uzz32soarer wrote: Got a few cars and just love making stuff so a bloke needs a bit of space.

You're my new hero! That's a significant project you have there.. nice work! And you are gonna make a few of us blokes a little green with envy at the amount of room you have.. My single car garage is my workshop and it is VERY full.. no room for the car anymore!

And welcome to the forum mate!

Flo

MinnesotaDave wrote:Excellent - love big buildings to work in....now if only a had a big building....

Oh well, I make do with about 30' x 32'

That's how i feel in my high school shop. It's about 300 sq ft. bigger than yours but that is split between woods and metals and with various people. Come up to the farm and have a 80'x60' and 20' tall shop I think to work in with an office and bathroom. Except most of that room is filled with machinery and junk.

Even if I had the time I wouldn't have the ambition to work on this project so kudos to you. I don't do well with heights and I'm sure it is sweltering hot in Aussie. Hope it all works out for you. I'm sure it will seeing how you decided to take the project on.

Farmwelding wrote:...and I'm sure it is sweltering hot in Aussie.

Time for a Geography lesson, FarmBoy. Oz is in the Southern Hemisphere and its currently the dead of winter there. Depending upon where in Oz he is, I suspect its rather chilly. In fact, his beautiful bride, Suzy is bundled up in a knit cap and fleece. Probably not welding gear

cj737 wrote:

Farmwelding wrote:...and I'm sure it is sweltering hot in Aussie.

Time for a Geography lesson, FarmBoy. Oz is in the Southern Hemisphere and its currently the dead of winter there. Depending upon where in Oz he is, I suspect its rather chilly. In fact, his beautiful bride, Suzy is bundled up in a knit cap and fleece. Probably not welding gear

You are dead right, it's bloody freezing. The great plan of building during the Summer and Autumn just didnt work due to council and permit issues. Now it's up early, brave the sub zero Yarra Valley Wintry mornings and get working. Generally thaw out by around ten and then you can feel your hands and do straight welds.

cj737 wrote:

Farmwelding wrote:...and I'm sure it is sweltering hot in Aussie.

Time for a Geography lesson, FarmBoy. Oz is in the Southern Hemisphere and its currently the dead of winter there. Depending upon where in Oz he is, I suspect its rather chilly. In fact, his beautiful bride, Suzy is bundled up in a knit cap and fleece. Probably not welding gear

Just how exactly cold does it get in Aussie? As I'm sure you know they don't cover the climate in Australia anymore, in fact the only thing we were taught is that it was an island for British prisoners. I also started watching Outback truckers a little so that doesn't help when the whole show is filmed during the summer months.

Outback truckers is exactly where it says in the "outback", much like a desert 99.9% of the year is 40°c +(up to 50°c) during the day and about 0°c at night when the sky is cloud free... the .1% its possibly raining!

So yeah hot all year round pretty much, this would be 2/3 of Australia(WA/SA/NT and upper Queensland) the mid to lower eastern states(NSW/Victoria/Tassie) are cooler to freezing at times.

Farmwelding wrote:

MinnesotaDave wrote:Excellent - love big buildings to work in....now if only a had a big building....

Oh well, I make do with about 30' x 32'

That's how i feel in my high school shop. It's about 300 sq ft. bigger than yours but that is split between woods and metals and with various people. Come up to the farm and have a 80'x60' and 20' tall shop I think to work in with an office and bathroom. Except most of that room is filled with machinery and junk.

80'x60' would be perfect for me

This summer I've split my time between shop welding, mobile welding, construction, dump truck driving - so my "work space" changes often.

Love watching stuff like this come together and LOVE big sheds.

I built my own shed, too, but I've outgrown it. The goal is to move to the foothills in the next few years and build a monster shed so that I can fill it up with tools and motorbikes.

Keep posting those pics!



Moz