cold wire feeders

Date 02-24-2004 17:19

does anyone have any experience with cold wire feeders for TIG? Do they help productivity? They mostly seem to be for automated systems. Is there a reason they are not common for manual (for lack of a better term) machines?

I'm working with aluminum.

thanks,
Pete

By bmaas1

Date 02-26-2004 20:07

I have used them and can honestly say I don't like them. You have to get them set just right to work, feed speed, location, etc.

Just my opinion,

Brian J. Maas

By welder_guy2001 (***)

Date 02-27-2004 01:29

It would be easier to just MIG weld them...essentially that's the same concept you're getting after.

By pfortin (*)

Date 02-27-2004 01:48

yeah, kinda... I tested some MIG welders at my local Miller Rep. on Monday for my product. It was way faster, but it didn't look as clean... more importantly, my boss said it didn't look good enough, so that pretty much killed MIG-ing my aluminum.

but my hopes were that I might get a little better speed and set-up using a cold wire feed... but that no longer seems very promising.

P.

By welder_guy2001 (***)

Date 02-28-2004 20:05

True...it does take some practice and knowledge of the machine to be able to put out a consistent looking weld w/ MIG'ing aluminum. There probably isn't an easier way around TIG welding it though. You might be able to weld a little faster if you had a good pulser machine hooked up to the TIG though. Once you get one of those dialed in to your specific application and welding style you can weld a little bit faster.