Hello...

Taking what seems to be quite common advice, I decided to get myself a big gas bottle before fully welding my chassis. I went to my local BOC person (who does the cylinders and nothing else, and doesn't seem to know much about it) and got sorted out with a good deal - £30 quid annual rental (what I dont use refunded), and £20 quid for every refil of Argoshield light. Plus VAT, and plus £8.95 'transaction charge' - grumble...

Anyway, being stupid and not knowing what I was doing, I didn't realise these bottles dont come with the regulator (if thats the right word for the thing with a gauge) so I can't use it yet. Phoned a local welding supplies place and they want £56 plus VAT for a new one.

Bloody hell!! All that money could have bought me about 15 of the little bottles from Halfords. Is this really gonna be worth it?

Well it's too late now - I need a regulator. I have one from the CO2 bottle my mate gave me (which he used for his car) but that wont fit my argoshild bottle - bugger. My bottle has a female 5/8 BSP thread, and my regulator seems to have one too.

So can you get an adaptor that will let me fit my regulator? Or can I just not use this one? Do I really have to pay £56+VAT for a new one? Can you hire them? Has anybody got a spare one?

Too late now to phone the shops so I thought I'd ask here. Cheers,

Liam

When I bought my bigger Sealey 185 welder it came with the type of regulator which fits pro bottle (like what you have now got). It has two gauges and flow adjustment knob. I wouldn't have thought it was quite £56 plus vat worth but getting on that way. It might be you could get one from the kind of place that sells Calor gas and barbecues etc

John

Liam, I'm on a welding course at the mo and we've just started on the mig - its got a big bottle of argoshield light with regulator/flow meters. I'll ask where they get it and what price. Not sure when but I'll try soonest.

I'll also ask about whether the regs are the same and adapters. If both regs are suitable, there must be a double ended male adapter available somewhere.

While we're on this, what size/output mig have people got? and what about power supply eg standard 13 amp or higher?

Geoff

Sound like all you need is a 5/8 male to male adaptor and you will be sorted these usually come with the regulators but won't cost much.

i used an oxygen reg on my co2 pub gas bottle with a couple of plumbing unions,take the bits to your local freindly plumbshop and ask them.

Paid £40 for mine when I got my BOC bottle. No choice, and it will still be cheaper than small bottle, I'm on my third large bottle! Don't know about the adapter situation tho.

As for MIGS I have a 130amp fan cooled mig, has never cut out on me even on long hot welds.

Thanks everyone!

Well if I can get an adaptor I'll be laughing. Otherwisw looks like I'll have to stump up for a regulator.

Cheers,

Liam

Liam DON'T USE the regulator you have, it wont take the pressure, your new bottle will be filled to about 3000psi chances are it will blow you regulator to bits and probably do it when you turn it on so taking your hand and probably your arm with it...

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Originally posted by Jasper
Paid £40 for mine when I got my BOC bottle. No choice, and it will still be cheaper than small bottle, I'm on my third large bottle! Don't know about the adapter situation tho.

As for MIGS I have a 130amp fan cooled mig, has never cut out on me even on long hot welds.

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when i got my regulator was told (by 2 different companys)

"we binned our adapters for co regs to argo bottles there shite and the co regs cant handle the extra pressure the diaphragms eventually go"

but my argo reg wit the 2 guages was 32 dabs had to make up an adapter for the smaller tube the welder runs but thats all

Just done a bit of research on the net - why didn't I think of that before?

My regulator says 230 bar on it which I assume is its maximum inlet pressure rating. My bottle says it's filled to 230 bar too so I assume it will be OK. 230 bar is...tap tap tap...3335.868 psi by the way. I also found an adaptor for about a fiver from...

www.tooled-up.com

In fact if you look at their single guage regulator - it's exactly the same as mine - i mean completely identical in every way. So I think I'm gonna stick with mine and use the adaptor.

Should be fine unless anyone thinks otherwise. In my brief internet reccy i didn't even see argon regulators rated above 230 bar, so I'd think mine should be fine, but comments like Viper's worry me slightly with my lack of experience. Anyone have anything to say before I go ahead and order that adaptor...?

Cheers

Liam

P.S. Why would you want TWO guages on your regultor? Is it like a twin 'zorst?

[Edited on 16/11/02 by Liam]

Sums are fun...

The BOC guy said my bottle contains 2.4 cubic metres of gas - so that's 2400 litres. The little bottles I buy contain only 60 litres (at much lower pressure). So my big bottle is like 40 of the little bottles - or £400 from my local PDMs!

Crikey! Mabe it is worth it then.

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3 bottles of gas? you are doing something wrong..you should easily be able to weld a dozen chassis with one bottle...

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A standard bottle is about 5 foot high, and thats a lot of gas. some one who is confident in welding/fabrication should be able to bash out a chasiss in a day, when my mig at work is running all day i rarely use a bottle a week, unless i am doing a heavy job when i turn the gas flow up to cool the torch,( i use a torch rated at over 300amps and still manage to melt them )

Two guages.one for the amount of pressure in the bottle the other for the amount of flow or pressure (depends on guage) coming out of the bottle. If the Regulator is marked at 230 bar then it should be ok, its just some regulators supplied with these little mig sets are realy not up to that kind of presure, one more thing there are companys out there that supply gas with regulators fitted to the bottle, Pro mig sets dont come witha regulator at all you have to buy them seperatley..

gas goes a long way,i use pub sized bottles,they last 6 months or so including mot welding,building chassis and repairing all sorts of shopping trolleys,garden implements etc etc etc

sounds like you have the flow about right conrod...

Thanks guys - I'll get that adaptor...

Now that I'm actually gonna be able to quantify my gas flow (rather than doing it by ear) what sort of figures to people use. My guage has 0 - 12 L/min or 0-24 CFH (whatever that is).

Cheers

Liam

On mine, 3-4 seems to work well

John

one thing i have noticed is a lot of people waste gas with leaks and not turning off the bottle when they are finished..as far as the flow rate goes that will realy depend on how fast you weld and whether or not you need it to cool the torch, i tend to run at about 8 ltrs/min but then i weld hot and fast, experiment you will be surprised at how little gas you need unless the wind is blowing it all away

quote:

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Originally posted by Liam
Thanks guys - I'll get that adaptor...

Now that I'm actually gonna be able to quantify my gas flow (rather than doing it by ear) what sort of figures to people use. My guage has 0 - 12 L/min or 0-24 CFH (whatever that is).

Cheers

Liam

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if theres any1 else about ur workshop check ur regulator each time youweld they have a habit of turning themselves up


dunno how but they just seem to do it

its the rats and spiders playing in my garage that do that!

go to AIR PRODUCTS theirs have built in reg and f/meters or i can sell you a one or tow stage for £20

I use a 5% mix bottle from Energas and in 2 years I have used about 2/3 of a bottle. I use a 2 stage reg, one dial shows the pressure left in the bottle, the other shows the pressure to the torch. My welder is an Erfi (German made) and is 170 amp. It replaced a sip 130 turbo about 5 years ago and has been brilliant, welding anything from 20 gauge for the tank to a 7" RSJ. On full power it will blow holes in 5mm plate if I hang about too long so it was well up to locost building. It cost £300 when I bought it and looks like it's staying till it expires.

yours, Pete.