Welding Tips and Tricks

Going to fixing some holes in my rockers on my truck. its 24ga and i have my 110 welding with 25c and .025 wire had some difficulty doing overhead on a previous patch, just wondering what kind of gun angle and technique I should use to get a flatter bead/seam should i cursive e the bead or Z it, forward and back? never been good at overhead let alone on such thine gauge stuff.

Body work is generally done with a bunch of tacks spread out over a long period of time. Weld beads will distort sheet metal. 24 ga seems a little thin to me, I usually over size stuff though.

my problem was that I couldn't spot it with the recommended settings, I had to wait till the area reached "optimum" temp before the weld would even wet in otherwise it was just sitting on top and not bonding to the other piece. I used a back step method but my welds were over an 1/8 high and had to grind half of that off. pretty didn't matter to me as i was spraying it with rocker guard rubberized stuff. the ease of having a black truck.

Rockers are usually 18 ga. and a main structural component on a cab. 24 ga. is what they use for heat ducts.

You really need to match the original metal thickness so you can get good penetration. Right now you are burning through the 24 and not getting any penetration on the original 18 ga rockers.

I'd suggest getting the rockers you need from some place like Raybuck - I just did that on my Sierra and they are nice and heavy. I considered trying to make my own but heavy gauge prerolled material was a better way to go. My truck is two tone so I just used the factory paint line as my cut and weld point as I didn't need to remove the entire rocker. I used a Lincoln Weld-pak 100 and a jillion spot welds. After grinding I really didn't need much filler at all. I had to buy two rockers as I have the crew cab. My total cost including the rockers, spot weld cutter and electric cut off wheel from HF, fiberglass, and Duracolor paints from Autozone was about $150. Maaco wanted $800 so it was worth doing.

Cheap rockers IMO are about 22-24 gage. Good rockers would be about 18-20. When I welded mine I measured the original (Chevy Silverado) and they were somewhere between 20 and 22 gauge. So I bought 22 gauge sheet metal. Paid ~ $10 for 12sq.ft.
I just cut out the patch put it on the old panel and outlined with Sharpie. Than cut it out and fitted the patch. Some minor bending was involved. I did butt weld all around. It worked quite well.
Welding was tough at first as I had to get the feeling and the rhythm of a series of a single spot welds. You stack them to get a solid bead. Some time was spent to find a sweet spot for a given metal and my machine. First rocker was OK, second was a breeze. I welded overhead laying on the floor. C25 gas was ramped to ~35cfm. Tacked in place and than did a solid bead. Than 80grit flap to flatten the bead.

I think I spent less than $70 for both rockers including filler, primer and paint. Still have 80% of filler left.
Something like:
Sheet metal - let's say $10
Filler - $25
Primer -$15 for two cans
Paint - $20 for two cans.

Mine were 18ga after i got to the good metal to measure. I added in patches instead custom cut and it worked out pretty good in the end i've found that my 110 LE power mig is the only time the recommended settings on the panel actually work when used with .025 and 25c.