it'll take more than a day to get it right
next, i don't know what you're doing wrong, but if you post some photos up, it'll be a lot easier for us to see what to suggest
[Edited on 15/4/09 by blakep82]
hey all,
Today i have spent the whole day trying to teach myself to weld and failing miserably!
kit - Im using a clarke 100EN MIG welder running 0.8mm wire and CO2 from a pub bottle. The welder is currently set to max and ive tried a variety of
wire speeds and gas pressures.
now im currently practising on a piece of steel about 2mm thick, nearest i could get to the chassis steel, and im just not getting any penetration at
all.
the welder runs max of 100A and according to the book will weld 3mm but from reading websites these thicknesses are aparently over rated and i should
expect 2mm, but i cant even get penetration on 2mm.
currently my welds look like piles of bird poo and are easily knocked off with a hammer.
an ex collegue says i should be running about 160A at least? am i underpowered or just doing something totally wrong?
cheers for any help at all
luke
first things first, don't rush yourself. rome wasn't built in a day
it'll take more than a day to get it right
next, i don't know what you're doing wrong, but if you post some photos up, it'll be a lot easier for us to see what to suggest
[Edited on 15/4/09 by blakep82]
You should be able to get your welds to stick pretty well with a 100A...... Not sure you would get FULL penetration... but they should stick non the
less...
Do you have your polarity the right way round for the earth clamp/weld tip?
you might want to slow the wire feed down quite a bit.... if you are running max power and you are pidgeno shitting.... could be your feed is to fast
of your earth is bad...
Put a location in your profile and someone might be able to help!!
Is the EN the one that's set up for gasless (although you can use gas) ?
If it is, you'll need to reverse the polarity on the torch for using gas, otherwise you'll get no penetration 
With gas, the torch should be +, the earth clamp -
[Edited on 15/4/09 by UncleFista]
Hi Luke,
i,m not a trained welder but my advice is just keep at it, vary your power/wire speed/gas pressure & your speed of the weld(your movement rate),
not sure where you are located but i,ve just finished an 11 week course at my local tech college, it was great & free, 12 weeks ago i,d never even
seen a mig up close, with the power that your mig is it might be that you are rushing the weld, may i suggest slow down & when you reach the point
of blow thru you know thats the point you want to avoid, if that makes sense?
cheers
andy
cheers for replies,
yer the EN can run gasless, i have it set up the right way and they have kindly put a huge picture on the front of the welder to demonstrate.
ill run outside now and take a pic for you to have a look at.
two ticks
Make sure you grind off or file the protective black coating that steel sometimes has so you are welding nice shiny steel, make sure the earth clamp
is good, I welded a pair of mole grips onto the end of my earth cable to make sure, also make sure the the point that you're earthing to is shiny
if possible just to try a rule out stuff.
Turn your gas on so you just hear it hissing then up a tiny bit more as a rough guide.
Put the wire speed somewhere in between a quarter and half with everything on full power.
Don't move the nozzle too fast away from you but do work in a slow figure of eight movement working away from yourself, so get yourself comfy
first.
If you have a blow torch try putting some heat into the metal first may also help.
I'm am no where near a pro welder but these few things seem to work for me.
Cheers
Rich
pic for you guys, sorry its a bit out of focus, camera didnt like the light of the flourescent.
try 6mm wire, and as previous post says clean up area grinder etc prior to welding you may also be moving the torch too fast. Persevere and all will come naturally start off with lower settings and work your way up, wire speed wiil be a major factor. Someone once told me youve got it right when it sounds like bacon sizling in a pan.
hmmm pic wont seem to work, wont let me put it in the gallery either, are JPEGs not supported?
mine doesnt sound like bacon, its too pulsey, like pop pop pop pop pop.
ive cleaned up both the working area and the clamp area with a grinder.
could it be the power is too high and its melting the wire before it gets the metal hot?
what wire speed are you set at & what pressure is your gas output?
andy
ive tried a variety of wire speeds from about 3 up to about 8 (out of 10)
as for gas, the gauge is before the valve on the regulator, the gauge shows about 800PSI IIRC and ive again tried the regulator at about 1/4 up to 3/4
open.
quote:
Originally posted by luke
hmmm pic wont seem to work, wont let me put it in the gallery either, are JPEGs not supported?
mine doesnt sound like bacon, its too pulsey, like pop pop pop pop pop.
ive cleaned up both the working area and the clamp area with a grinder.
could it be the power is too high and its melting the wire before it gets the metal hot?
)
quote:
Originally posted by blakep82
hmm, by that it sounds like the wire speeds too slow?
jpg's are supported, but needs to be a unique file name (from every other file name on everyone elses archive, i learned this week
ok, i,m using a Clarke 151en set to run on gas, i use wire speed 5 or 6 but gas pressure is quite low, when setting the gas a tip i got from welding
course at college was this....
the gas coming out of the torch should be like someone just gently blowing on your face, not a force ten hurricane,
try this.. set your wire speed in middle of available speed, your amps on full & gas set low & weld one spot, see how long it takes to burn
thru & then you have a reference point to work from, thats how they taught us at college to get the feel for the settings/torch, tho remember it
changes when you weld thicker metals.
andy
i was welding a bit today with a clarke 151te, generally my wire speed is set at 5, it needs slight adjusting at different powers. mine has 6 power
settings, not sure about yours, is it 4?
i'd start at lowest power, and set the wire speed to 5 and see how you go. once you work out whats right for the lowest power, then work your way
up.
edit: or try what andy says above. that'll give you a feel for how quick to move the torch, but i think you'll need to get the right wire
speed first, in which case try mine
[Edited on 15/4/09 by blakep82]
quote:
Originally posted by blakep82
i was welding a bit today with a clarke 151te, generally my wire speed is set at 5, it needs slight adjusting at different powers. mine has 6 power settings, not sure about yours, is it 4?
i'd start at lowest power, and set the wire speed to 5 and see how you go. once you work out whats right for the lowest power, then work your way up.
edit: or try what andy says above. that'll give you a feel for how quick to move the torch, but i think you'll need to get the right wire speed first, in which case try mine
[Edited on 15/4/09 by blakep82]
The clarke 150 range are designed (in theory) to have the correct wire speed at setting 5. You then adjust as necessary.
(note this is a concept - but it will get you started if the 100 is the same setup.
Defo clean the steel.
Defo make sure the earth is on clean steel.
Weld next to the edge of the steel - with it being next to the edge there is less metal to take the heat away and it should all go glowing hot and
make you feel better.
The sound you want is a combination of sizzling bacon and ripping silk / cotton.
start off moving the gun at between .5 and 1cm a second (i've guessed the speed before someone tells me its wrong)
Keep the torch about tip about 1cm from the metal and at a 60 degree angle - pulling the torch (ie 60 degrees from where the weld is going to be 120
degrees from where the weld is).
errm.... errr.... its late, i've got a cold and can't sleep - have a go with that lot & sorry for the mistakes
thanks for all the tips, im going to give another crack at it tomorrow.
think the old saying of bad workman always blames his tools is present here 
tell you what, get a photo emailed to me, i'll put it on here for you
blakeperkins82@hotmail.com
Have you set enough tension on the feed roller? It should be set so that if you point the torch at the concrete floor and press the trigger you should
feel a reasonable "kick" from the wire feeding through but it should still slip without causing a birds nest between feed roller and torch.
Also, is your wire clean and not rusted up like most welding wire tends to be when not used for a few months. If it's rusted up then remove wire
from the spool until you reach clean wire.
Also, check that your electrode is not set too far inside the gas cup. I usually have mine about 5mm inside the gas cup so that I can weld with around
10 - 15 mm of wire between torch and weld pool.
HTH,
Craig.
blake,
email sent, thank you!
ok, here we go guys,
luke
looks like not enough gas actually, because that can have a sort of crystaline effect, but i'm not sure about this now 
WTF is going on there - never seen anything like that before!
Are you sure it is CO2 in your cylinder? Having said that I would expect better results than that with no gas!
Is the welder broken? I have a Sealey 100A turbo and it can easily weld 2mm mild steel.
i might be totally wrong but to me it looks like both wire speed & gas is set too high, looking at the bits of wire left beside the metal.
just my opinion.
andy
if the gas is too high could it be having a cooling effect?
i did have it accidently without gas at one point and was still getting same results.
Got the look of too high wire speed to me.
Cheers
Vorn
I did most of my locost chassis with a Clarke 105EN welder, and whilst it struggled a bit with 3mm plate, it made a lovely job of welding 16 gauge
RHS. Current was set to max for almost every job I used it for on the locost, only turned it down for thin body panels.
You really need to use 0.6 wire with this welder, and make sure the tip is in good condition. I never had much luck with 0.8mm, I don't think
the welders up to it. Even on my current 150Amp MIG, 0.6mm wire seems to work better on the kind of jobs I use it for.
The earth clamps on these welders are pretty flimsy, and a good earth is absolutely essential. Make sure the earth point is clean shiny metal and
that the earth clamp is really secure.
Are you using the welder on a long extension lead? This can impact weld quality.
Is the wire nice and shiny? If it's gone rusty unwind enough to expose clean shiny wire and cut off the rusty stuff.
Are you definitely getting gas through? If you hold the tip up close to your ear and squeeze the trigger very slightly you should be able to hear the
gas coming out before the wire starts spooling.
[Edited on 16/4/09 by MikeRJ]
Go to www.mig-welding.co.uk, that forum is excellent!
The tutorials are good too, taught myself to weld from those
Hi There
It looks like a combination of a lack of shielding gas and wire speed set to high.
Also are you using pure C02?, I usually use a CO2/ Argon mix as i find this a better gas to wrk with
Matt
Yikes look at those 'welds', that pigeons got the runs…
turn the wire speed right down till it starts to pulse on and off as the wire is burnt back every time the arc strikes then gradually speed it up till
it melts at the same rate its being fed in. Your looking for around 1.5-2 inch’s a second feed rate depending on wire diameter.
Mind that if you are using it at full power you will have to stick meticulously to the duty cycle of the machine, if you don't then the welder
will fry. Best to put the welder outside in the wind (you can use the handset inside still) to help with the cooling.
[Edited on 16/4/09 by Mr Whippy]
If your local tech does night school courses on welding, go.
2hrs/week for ten weeks.
I had a brilliant time, gas, stick and mig and all for £60.
quote:
Originally posted by Confused but excited.
If your local tech does night school courses on welding, go.
2hrs/week for ten weeks.
I had a brilliant time, gas, stick and mig and all for £60.
quote:
Originally posted by Confused but excited.
If your local tech does night school courses on welding, go.
2hrs/week for ten weeks.
I had a brilliant time, gas, stick and mig and all for £60.
is the welder know to be working?
if you are on max current, you should be blowing holes in that steel.
even without gas you should get better blobs.
most unusual.
YES YES YES! SUCCESS!
went out with a fresh head just, set up the gas so felt like someone blowing on my hand (was originally like a tornado!) turned wire speed down to
about one and a half and went a did a belter of a weld straight away!
ok, it isnt the neatest straightest weld, but its still a weld! was so excited i had to just come tell you all :p
thanks for everyones comments last night, if it wasnt for you guys i would of given up today :p your all credits to the locost way!
good work
well done (or 'weld done' as my dad always says...)
Show us a picture
We love welding photos!!!
If you're running a welder at the bleeding edge of performance (which sadly for a 90/100A unit is 2mm thick stuff) you need to wack it on full
wallop, pull down the wire speed and move slowly to get heat into the steel.
If penetration is still a problem it's worth investing in a new earth clamp. It's amazing what a difference that can make!!!
ooo, bens post has reminded me, i also ground the points of the welding clamp so they were shiny again.
pic in a bit if i can get them uploaded again!
quote:
Originally posted by BenB
Show us a picture
, i've got some of my own to put up in a sec anyway
damn thing wont let me upload them again!
blaaaaaake
go on then
thank you!
Description
looking much better!
thanks blake! amazing how much a difference actually setting the welder up correctly makes!
That looks better 
Few more like that and you should be ready to make a chassis
Deleted as didn't see the second page of replies, dohh!
PS. Nice improvement
[Edited on 17/4/09 by flibble]
[Edited on 17/4/09 by flibble]