Hi:
I'm a newbie, and I'm trying to get a neater looking weld on a home table project. Here's the details.
I'm using a Chicago Electric wire feed arc welder with 0.30" flux-cored wire. The welder has two power settings, 55 amps and 90 amps, and I'm using the 55 amp setting, and I have the wire feed speed set low (dial at about 1).
I'm attempting to build some "wrought-iron" and ceramic tile end-tables. I'm using 1/8" thick 3/4" wide forged steel angle stock for the horizontal pieces. I'm cutting each piece with 45 degree ends, so 4 pieces can be butted together to form a square with a lip on the inside to support a 12" square piece of ceramic tile. I'm doing the weld on the underside so it'll be hard to see. For legs, I'm then welding a 5/8 steel rod to each corner, with the weld done on each side of where the rod touches the corner.
I want the weld to end up being one fairly consistent glob of material. (Sorry for the highly technical term!) What I'm getting is several very bumpy globs of material. There's lots of "bumps" from splatter away from the weld. Overall, it's very messy looking, and will take a lot of grinding to get it to look neat. What can I do to get this to look neater? I'm going to list some guesses below. Please tell me if any of these guesses are right, or add any suggestions you might have.
1) Use the higher heat setting, 90 amps. Will this help me get one big glob of material rather than several smaller globs?
2) I realize the splatter away from the weld is mainly caused by the flux bubbling and popping. I don't want to spend the money for a MIG welder, and the FCAW welder does not have a way to add shielding gas. What would happen if I used plain (ie. non flux-cored) wire with no shielding gas to do this weld? I realize that the weld would be weaker, but then I'm welding a small ornamental table, not an automobile frame. Would this eliminate the splatter and give me a neater looking single glob weld?
3) Should I perhaps consider trying to braze the joint instead of welding it?
4) Any other suggestions? Remember that I'm a newbie at this! I work on computers for a living, but I'm trying welding simply to build these tables (and maybe other home projects in the future), so I need to keep it as simple and inexpensive as possible!
Best regards,
Dave
Dave,
Sounds like you are having some fun with this.
1) Since your machine only has two settings for the amperage I would try the highest setting since most of the welds are small. This will help on your starts.
2) As far as your wire speed you need to dial it in to where you have a steady arc. This can be done on a spare piece of metal.
3) Make shure your base metal has no rust or scale, I have found that using the Flux-cored wire with these machines is kinda tricky. You need to take advantage of every edge you can get.
4) The angle that you weld on the back side you may want to try grinding a groove at the joint so after welding you can grind the weld flush.
5) You will not be able to weld without self shielding wire
If the welder only has two amp settings, then I assume you are using a constant current (CC) power source. (Does it have a voltage setting?) If you use a CC power source with the Flux Cored Arc Welding (FCAW) or Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW) processes, you will need a voltage sensing wire feeder. (Is this the case? - I do not know the wire feeder you mentioned.)
If you do not have either a Constant Voltage (CV) power source or a CC power source with voltage sensing wire feeder, you will basically not be able to get a decent weld. My suggestion is therefore to make sure that you actually have a welding set-up that will work. (You should be able to see the power source and wire feeder types by checking the nameplates.) Otherwise, you are just making life difficult and frustrating for yourself.
Regards
Niekie
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