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Posted by Charles Ping on July 21, 2008, 10:37 am
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I need to weld some thin mild steel and find that my Mig is a bit
crude and vicious on mild steel this thin. I'm wondering if one of the
modern DC Tig inverter welders would be better for thin mild steel. Of
course a full AC/DC Tig would be nice for versatility but they never
come anywhere near a sensible price.
Any direct experience of the current crop of DC Tig inverter welding
kit welcomed.
Thanks
Charles
http://www.homeworkshop.org.uk
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Posted by Tim on July 22, 2008, 3:25 am
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Charles Ping wrote:
> I need to weld some thin mild steel and find that my Mig is a bit
> crude and vicious on mild steel this thin. I'm wondering if one of the
> modern DC Tig inverter welders would be better for thin mild steel. Of
> course a full AC/DC Tig would be nice for versatility but they never
> come anywhere near a sensible price.
>
> Any direct experience of the current crop of DC Tig inverter welding
> kit welcomed.
>
> Thanks
>
> Charles
Charles
No *direct* experience, but as no-one else has answered....
I've got what you might call a 'first generation' cheap & cheerful
inverter TIG set, it works, the HF (which is spark generated) seems to
me too powerful when working at low currents as it can tend to swamp the
welding current. Having said that, I've never really mastered TIG anyway..
It serves an excellent stick set, btw. Nowhere near as light & portable
as some of the current offerings.
Not TIG, just a basic stick set, I recently bought an R 140i from
http://www.newarc.co.uk/
which is a brilliant little set, with the emphasis on little. If you
could run to one of their TIG sets, I doubt that you would be disappointed.
im
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Posted by moray on July 22, 2008, 6:27 am
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>I need to weld some thin mild steel and find that my Mig is a bit
> crude and vicious on mild steel this thin. I'm wondering if one of the
> modern DC Tig inverter welders would be better for thin mild steel. Of
> course a full AC/DC Tig would be nice for versatility but they never
> come anywhere near a sensible price.
>
> Any direct experience of the current crop of DC Tig inverter welding
> kit welcomed.
I've got a Cebora DC set-up, but it's not exactly at the cheap end of the
scale, but certainly no where near the expensive end.
I picked mine up of ebay a couple years ago for a good price. I think I paid
about a 1/3 retail for a machine in as new condition.
It's mainly been used for repairing rusty body panels, but occasionally sees
use on stainless.
Personally I'd recommend paying more for HF start, as it makes starting
welds far easier. I have used the lift start option, and although it's
perfectly useable (might mainly be due to the cebora electronics which ramp
up the current after you lift off), HF is just so much easier.
Plus as Tim has said, it doubles up as a very nice stick welder (although
remember to swap the neg/pos leads around, otherwise it can make for some
interesting welding attempts!)
moray
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Posted by Pip Luscher on July 25, 2008, 3:18 pm
Please log in for more thread options On Mon, 21 Jul 2008 07:37:24 -0700 (PDT), Charles Ping
>I need to weld some thin mild steel and find that my Mig is a bit
>crude and vicious on mild steel this thin. I'm wondering if one of the
>modern DC Tig inverter welders would be better for thin mild steel. Of
>course a full AC/DC Tig would be nice for versatility but they never
>come anywhere near a sensible price.
>
>Any direct experience of the current crop of DC Tig inverter welding
>kit welcomed.
For really thin stuff, TIG with a pedal and/or pulse mode would give
the desired control. But they're expensive. Also, AFAIK TIG needs
argon or argon mixes, which are expensive.
--
-Pip
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Posted by John on July 28, 2008, 3:40 am
Please log in for more thread options Do you have to weld this? Brazing may be a better alternative as it
doesn't melt the parent metal.
Have you considered gas welding?
When I needed to weld some thin steel, I found a gas set beat a MIG
welder. My technique was to use a thick filler rod as a thermal mass
to avoid making holes in the steel. Preheating the end of the rod to
almost meting point before applying it to the weld area helped as
well.
John
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> crude and vicious on mild steel this thin. I'm wondering if one of the
> modern DC Tig inverter welders would be better for thin mild steel. Of
> course a full AC/DC Tig would be nice for versatility but they never
> come anywhere near a sensible price.
>
> Any direct experience of the current crop of DC Tig inverter welding
> kit welcomed.
>
> Thanks
>
> Charles