gtaw mild steel gas

Date 09-13-2004 20:57

Well i'm ready to start practicing with my torch but I have one major flaw. I'M CHEAP! I have co2 reg. and bottle and was wondering if this will work for a shielding gas. I know it works for gmaw but everything I have seen for gtaw assumes your building air frames or nuclear reactors. All I want to do is join a hundred or so pieces of 2" mild steel tube to get the feel for this process. I will eventually get some Ar for ss pipe but that is a thousand inches away.

thanks byron

By medicinehawk (**)

Date 09-13-2004 22:28

Co2 will not help you so do not waste your time or gas....You might be able to stabilze the arc to lay some metal, but the weld will be brittle and full of holes (porosity).
You need straight argon especially if you are cheap as you can pay more for bi & tri mixures of argon and other gases, but why bother??

By Diesel

Date 09-13-2004 22:48

In my haste to get a quick answer I overlooked my chemistry book. Now as im looking at it I can see that co2 disassociates at a fairly low temp. Let me guess: Lots of oxidation splater and 65% (by weight) conversion to CO. I'll go get a bottle of Ar tonight.
byron