Please advise/help with my welding

[Jerry L]

As they used to say in the shop, a good metal finisher can make anyone look like a good welder!
Have Fun!

[Phil Planck]

There are several good metal working forums with lots of great welding info. Allmetalshaping.com is very good.

But will add:
Strong light on weld area so you can see what you are doing. I like rechargeable led lights. Enough heat already so stay away from halogen.

Tack weld every 5 8th inch or so. Then as said smooth each tack and planish each tack(dolly behind and slapper on tack)
Repeat until gaps filled. Slow and tedious but works

[Jerry L]

One more note on running the small diameter wire, before you say my welder wont run it due to the drive rollers, some manufacturers allow you to flip the pinch roller to have a flat surface vs the small rad on that roller (drive roller stays with the rad for alignment) other manufacturers you need to buy a flat pinch roller to run wire smaller than .032" / .8mm consistently without slipping / hanging up in the gun / delivery tube. (another issue in setting up your machine / gun) My Miller needed the additional roller from memory, machine is at my brothers for a Harley project.

Best Regards

[aturboman]

I'll admit I did not read every post fully so this maybe redundant advise. But to weld any thin or even medium thickness material I use copper sheeting as a heat sink.

If I have access behind the panel I back the whole weld area with thin copper sheet. If you cannot get behind it then copper sheet laid adjacent to the weld area is still very helpful.

The copper is flexible enough to bend and with carefully place long reach clamps and magnets it is relatively easy to hold in place.

For tubing slip in scrap copper water pipe and it works wonders, also a copper faced welding spoon held behind works great as well.

Other things mentioned like not running a bead, thin wire, super clean prep, and careful temp control all make this task much easier.

Lastly the quality of the machine makes a huge difference. I could not weld cleanly on a budget machine for anything.

Took a leap of faith and invested in a pro grade machine and that alone was night and day.

[Bobs 67S]

GeorgeK,

body welding should include a reference to this Canadian guy working from his garage. Look up on YouTube Fritzee's Fabrications

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MPy...M99Wj&index=11

at about 6min and again at about 16min are two jewels of information. He cuts his patch panels over size - spot welds to hold in place - cuts with a cut off disk at a 45 degree to the two panel seam, this allows the cut to have overlap allowing for easy level alignment. Includes details of how to patch exterior panels without warping those large flat panels.

Give him a look.


A few tid bits of info I have heard to help us have better weld results.

1) Grind the weld use a 2’ 3M roll lock disk, 24 grit for the first couple of passes.

2) move to 50 grit 3M roll lock, have seen the edges cut to 6mm “V”s around the edge to help feather the finish.

3) Grind with the disk edge in line with the weld not at 90 degree (across). It’s a smaller area of contact. It helps control a clean cut and less side panel damage.

4) When laying a short beads Grind those small sections right after the weld. It will help the weld to cool slower and have less cracking to the welds.

[lkadams]

GeorgeK,

body welding should include a reference to this Canadian guy working from his garage. Look up on YouTube Fritzee's Fabrications

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MPy...M99Wj&index=11

at about 6min and again at about 16min are two jewels of information. He cuts his patch panels over size - spot welds to hold in place - cuts with a cut off disk at a 45 degree to the two panel seam, this allows the cut to have overlap allowing for easy level alignment. Includes details of how to patch exterior panels without warping those large flat panels.

Give him a look.

Thanks for the link! My father was from the East Coast of Canada so his accent takes me back!

[GeorgeK]

Being the weekend, I have again time to practice.
I took 2 scraps off the Beetle, cut a straight edge and cleaned them with a finger belt grinder, which is easier to handle than the disc grinder. The edges fit together without a visible gap.
I cleaned the welding gun, the helmet glass, the grounding clamp (not real dirty but I figured, every bit helps).
I used my self built welding table/cart - you can see some of the better welds I managed on this one.
Using no more than 1/2 second bursts, I spot welded the parts at the ends and in the middle, then hopped my way around.
I used a magnet based LED light to shine straight on the welded area.

The good:
-No burn-through!
-No significant warping.
-Little spatter.
-A nice, bacon sizzling sound

The questionable:
-Some light gets through after grinding the welds down, which can be traced to uneven spacing of the weld spots, to complete.
-The penetration? See pics from the other side of the weld. I *could* run a bead on this side as well, even on the car, but I can't tell whether this penetration is enough. -It seems solid - I can't tear the weld apart, although it is a bit weak on the side that lets light through, which makes sense, since I need to complete it there.

Pics below, critics welcome.

[GeorgeK]

Pics of shine through:

[uai]

If you grind more in between welding this will not happen that much
Cheers
Uli

[Will 1967]

I’d say that metal is not even close clean enough at start, and not enough penetration. IMO that thickness can be welded also without grinding between welds if not large flat panel.
I would practise first with new sheet, e.g 0.9mm thickness but need to be cleaned as well! (Wire brush with electric drill or roloc ”finishing” pad)