Been praticing my tig welding today.
Everywhere I go I hear the same story of "some old time welder who could weld beer cans together"
So I did that. And it could be cleaner but it wasn't bad for only two months of tig welding. Not bad for a 19 year old self taught fabricator huh?

 

I'm impressed!
(';')

 

I've never learned how to weld at all, well or poorly. My hat's off to ya !

Cheers
DD

 

Anything I ever tried to weld just fell apart, well done.

 

some people pick up welding very easy!

some, no matter how they try, never make an acceptable welder.

but one thing for sure it takes practice and patience, i have watched good welders, and it seems they go into a ZONE or something.

 

Before I became a Flight Engineer I was a "Metal Smith" (tin bender) in the Navy, welding was part of the job and it's always something I enjoyed doing. I had a friend on the Enterprise that was said to be able to weld two gum wrappers together, the guy was amazing when it came to welding. Needless to say when he got out the ship fitters came calling and he pretty much named his own price!

 

That's awesome, I hope to.get to that level of skill in the future.

I've been doing a ton of aluminum pratice, going through bottles of argon a day, preparing to make these intake manifolds

 

Calvin,

You're one of two people in recent posts who say they are learning TIG in order to weld mods onto their Jag. For you, it's stainless for your headers. For the other person, it's aluminum, for his quad turbo project, but, as demonstrated here, you are also practicing TIG on aluminum.

I'm just curious as to why you're doing it, when MIG is also capable of welding both stainless and aluminum. I know that TIG makes prettier welds, but, to my knowledge, they aren't necessarily better welds. If I care about how a welded piece looks, chances are good that I'm going to grind the weld flat anyways, so I don't understand the need for expensive TIG equipment, if you already have a MIG on hand. Am I missing something?

 

Well Done!
I now how hard it is it weld Aluminium, just finished, well close finished rebuilding a 21ft boot with a coroded hull, first sign of impurity and it all goes to hell! One thing that made it worse it was all verticle welds, can't recall how many times I set myself alight, lol. If you ever need any advice on Aluminium welding get hold of Kevin Morin in Alaska, is reputed to be one the best aluminium welders around, nice bloke will help you no end. Just google "Kevin Morin Welder" or you can contact him through the alloyboat forum.

 

Scott
Tig will do a so much better and job on the thinner materials than mig and your dead right to get a good AC tig for Aluminium runs into a few thousand and you need the power to run it, 3 phase with lots of amps.
In saying that I run a mig but have a hard time in Aluminium under 3mm, for larger stuff up to 10mm and for long runs its great well boat building basically but if you need a precise job with 100% welds you must TIG, Even fuel tanks are Tigged as Mig is too hit and miss. Just wish I had the coin to buy an AC Tig, stainless you weld with a DC Tig and you get a good one for under a 1K.

 

Nice weld. But that's looks like a Diet Dr Pepper and Coke can. I know drinking in the US is strictly over 21, but someone is short changing you

 

Tig does a much prettier weld. Mig can do almost anything, but its a lot more agressive on thin metal. They don't mig headers because they end up so work hardened they often crack.

But tig welding has it's faults. One it doesn't work if the metal is any kind of dirty, and that is a major problem if you're trying to weld rusted body panels or marine stuff like boat propellers or hulls (like previously mentioned)

 

i always had trouble welding Anodized hardened aluminum, bought sheet from a recicyle place, cut it up for making an intercooler, and it was a mess of welding, got some different aluminum and it welded up close to perfect.

seems we are always learning!

the whole car industry has changed(at least for me) since custom intakes and turbo systems have become the norm! tig has become the norm for aluminum and stainless , mig for steel piping and frame work, and again tig for chromoly.

never could weld Titainium, correctly.
never seen anybody that could,(except a Japanese guy,20yrs old).