So after much playing about with welder settings, I think I've got my welding to a good enough level on the chassis tubes. Have given it the hammer test and the tubing bends before any damage to the welds so I'm guessing that's good enough? Any hints/tips before I start building the chassis up? Incidentally, I bought a flat pack chassis for ease of build.

It sounds ok what you have done but can you please put some photos of your welds on here so we can see them
Jacko

There is a general rule to chassis welding, and I'm hoping someone can describe it better than me, but here goes

You need to weld opposite tubes so that it deflects/bends in uniformity and the deflections from each side/top/bottom cancel each other out.

You should always tack weld the whole chassis first before fully welding, but guess you already knew that bit!

HTH
Steve

Sorry, not great photos but here you go... The split down the middle is where I sliced it open with a 1mm cutting blade.

[Edited on 9/6/08 by Jezzer99]
Rescued attachment DSCF1844.JPG

and this... again not great!
Rescued attachment DSCF1852.JPG

very difficult to see with the picks - but it looks like the weld sticks up a lot, this implies the wire speed is too high.

Can't see what the penetration is like, sorry.

Without better photos is impossible to tell but if the weld looks like its sitting on top of the steel and not fused to two bits together its not got good enough penetration.

in the Tiger avon book there is page about getting welds tested. Not sure of costs. contact 01625 87309 (welding tests).

Does the camera have a macro setting?.

What welder are you using?