Morning all

A question for all you welders. I'm looking to make a light weight frame out of steel rod as it's easy to bend and shape. What is the smallest diameter I'd be able to work with if I wanted to weld various rods together. The sizes I was looking at are 6 & 8mm. Is this too small?

I know as much about welding as I do electrics so any assistance would be appreciated.

Thanks as always
Nigel

All dependes on what your frame is for i suppose

Either will be fine, use .8mm wire with 60 amps, maybe higher on 8mm - 8mm, and practice on scrap, you'll soon get the feel of it.

The frame is non load bearing just to provide shape and be rigid.

The size you need will depend on how strong it needs to be/ what its used for.

As for being too small to weld. with a tig welder you can easily weld 2 filler rods together end to end that are 1.6mm dia. so nothing is too small for welding

Cheers for the answers and advice all. It was more can you weld it than how would you, I'll get someone who can weld to do it for me when the time comes. Just didn't want to go to the trouble of building something only to be told it can't be welded.

Have a good weekend everyone.

Well, it is possible to weld a coke can if you're lucky/careful enough, and although I'm only getting reasonable at welding I can stick 1mm sheet together easily so an 8mm rod should be easy to do!