tips on welding with a smallrod for SMAW

By reject Date 08-03-2002 19:45

I'm a young welding student currently working towards my certification in stick and wire. I have only been welding with larger rods like 7024 or 7018. My buddy has small project for me welding some bicycles for fun. He's got this cheesy little welder he bought from a friend. It's a sears craftsman welder that only goes up to 100 volts. it plugs into a 25v outlet which he changed to plug in to a normall 20v outlet in his garage. I told him it would'nt work but it does some how. The problem I'm having is getting these little 6011 1/8 and 2000 universal 5/32 rods to hold an arc. I can get it to strike but not arc. Does the welder need more juice or is my inexperience in welding with these little rods the problem? I did get a small bead when I slowly draged the the rod to stike it finally did work but not for very long. any tips for me thanks alot.

By Jay Krout (*)

Date 08-03-2002 21:41

Try using 3/32 6011 rods, there is probably nothing wrong with the machine, it's probably an AC machine and they are alright to use but being as how it's only 100amps you are asking it to work a whole lot harder than it was designed to. 6011 rods work quite well on AC if they are dry, set your machine at about 70-80 amps and work from there to see what works, and practice on some scrap so you don't mess up what you are working on while you find your way through it. Good luck hope this helps J Krout

By welder_guy2001 (***)

Date 08-04-2002 04:21

yeah, 5/32 is a bit large for that size machine...even 1/8 might be a bit much, but i'll bet w/ some practice you could get 1/8" 6011 to work well. and besides, for bikes, you don't need that big of a bead, so 3/32 of any rod would work well.

get some scrap plate to get used to holding an arc and running a bead. lots of times different rods act differently, and they look different while welding. start w/ a very long arc to get a feel for it, then slowly close the gap between the rod and the plate. 6011 penetrates more than 7018, so you might have to whip and pause the bead moving downhill at a fast pace to keep from burning through if the steel is 16 - 12 ga or so.

and as long as you don't max out the amperage on the machine and work it hard, you won't blow that 20 A circuit. but like the other guy said, you shouldn't need much more than 70-80 amps to run 3/32 6011...and if your steel is very thin, you might even be down around 60 amps

By boilermaker (**)

Date 08-07-2002 02:57

First off....7024 and 7018 are electrode designations, not sizes....Yes the welder would need a lot more juice...I'm assuming that you're plugging in to 120V outlet....I know the machines we use currently have 39.4V open circuit voltage...so I doubt that you have 100 volts to run OCV...1/8 and 5/32 are way too large of electrodes for that type of machine, and the best way to really let the machine last and still be able to make quality welds....get some 1/16" 6013, and some 1/16" 7018...if you weld 3/32 on too high of an amperage, you're likely to exceed the duty cycle and burn up the machine....I've burned up my fair share of 400 amp machines running flux core wire all day at 32V and 650-700 in./min. of wire...the company wasn't happy, but we told them their machines couldn't take the heat. Try the smallest electrodes you can find...Most smaw only go to 1/16"....Good luck