Wobbly tig welds.

By jwright650 (*****)

Date 06-13-2003 19:55

Practice, practice........practice some more. It will come keep working on it.
John Wright

By UKmxer

Date 06-13-2003 20:05

Thanks John

I am now on my fourth X size Argon bottle and things are getting slighlty better but I can not get the changover to match.

thx for your reply

By pipewelder_1999 (****)

Date 06-14-2003 00:07

Your problem may be related to the temperature of the base metal. Do you let the tubing cool between beads?

G Austin

By TimGary (****)

Date 06-14-2003 10:50

Old Welding Proverb...
"The more comfortable the welder, the better the weld."

By welder_guy2001 (***)

Date 06-14-2003 18:33

rest your hands on the material so you're not relying on your whole body to be steady. sometimes it's hard to sense that you're body is wobbling because you can't see anything around yourself. but if your arms and hands are resting on something, you'll be able to tell when you're moving. the key to making each puddle the same size and distance from the other is consistency. do the same exact thing every time you dip the rod into the puddle and you will end up with a consistent looking weld.

By UKmxer

Date 06-14-2003 20:14

The problem seems to be me. I just can not carry on welding as I was before I changed the position of the workpiece. It either starts with a thinner run or thicker or not on the same centreline as the previous weld. And I still wobble occasionally which then appears in the run.
Do you lads watch behind the tungsten in the area where the weld pool has been, so you can continue the weld with the same width as what as just been done when joing to previuos weld. Or do you just weld and watch where the pool is going.

By MikeR

Date 06-23-2003 16:36

Watch EVERYTHING!!!! And practice practice practice. If you're using a remote amp control (foot pedal), you might not be going back to the same amperage when you continue your bead. If that's the case, on steel, try setting the panel setting so all you do is max the pedal and keep it there. That atleast might tell you part of your problem. (this technique will not work on aluminum!)

By TiG6al-4v (*)

Date 09-12-2003 01:30

When I first started Tig welding, i thought you had to set the panel settings to a specific amperage, pending on the thickness and type of metal, for example; 4130 chromally, .050 wall, 6g position .75 dia. full penetration. Argon purge, 100% pure. Set it 50 amperes, and floor it.
Any great TIG welder would know that you should be able to set the tig machine to 250 amperes and use your foot pedal to control 100%, maybe more, of your HEAT.
Jeff

By Lawrence (*****)

Date 09-12-2003 11:59

Interesting procedure Jeff

While perhaps not a "great" tig welder, I teach a bit differently when it comes to setting up GTAW.

If I were welding that 0.050 4130. I would consider the maximum output I might need to quickly get full penetration in a fillet of that thickness and perhaps set my machine panel about 5 to 10 amps above that. The benefit found here is that I now have the entire length of the foot pedal "throw" (from tapping on the arc to floored) to make fine adjustments as I weld and perhaps encounter poor fits or heat sinks.

With the panel setting at 250 I could possibly make the same weld but the amount of foot pedal travel I had at my disposal would be very limited.

When I see welders struggeling for consistency in in thin to thick fillets, poor panel settings are the primary culprit. The high panel setting really shackels the operator and removes any fine control.

The percision found between 5 and 35 amps on a single foot pedal throw is a far better place to be when welding thin material than a foot pedal throw between 25 and 250 amps.

Lawrence

By MBlaha

Date 09-13-2003 04:00

Several questions:
1. As you travel across the tube, are you changing the angle of your torch. The more you angle your torch, the more you loose control of you heat. Think of the tungsten as a cone which is producing a cone in the arc. The more you angle your torch, the wider the cone becomes thus, you loose control of your heat.
2. As you travel across the tube, are you pulling your tungsten away from the tube? Increasing the tungsten to work piece distance will also cause you to loose control of your heat.
3. Is your tungsten contaminated?
Any contamination on the tungsten causes the arc to jump off the tungsten above the tip of the tungsten which is where you want all your current traveling from. If it is jumping off above or before the sharp point of the tungsten, again, you are loosing control of your heat.

When instructing GTAW, these are the biggest problems that hinder a person new to the process. Try to think of the tip of your tungsten as the driving force where you want all your heat or current coming from. When you sharpen your tungsten, are you sharpening it parallel to the grinding wheel, or holding it at an angle with the tungsten making a groove in the wheel? This is the proper process, except move the tungsten on the wheel and do not cut grooves as this severly limits the life of your wheel. Rolling the tungsten on the rest of the grinder causes your lines to go circumfriential with the tungsten. This will also cause the arc to jump off the tungsten before the sharpend tip. Making the grinding lines run with the tungsten, (lenthwise) allows the current to follow to the tip, thus keeping better control of your heat/

I hope this makes sense. I can explain it a lot better verbaly rather than typing it. LOL

Mike