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So for xmas, I started asking for Home Depot gift cards so I could get a welder for myself. With the gift cards and a few Craigslist sales, I went and bought a Lincoln HD180 wire feed welder. I followed up with a cart from work to hold the welder, and got the gas mix required to weld correctly. All this, and I've never welded in my life.

This weekend my brother in law was over and he helped me get started up. He has a lot of welding experiece and gave me a bunch of pointers to get started. So I spent some time today making what you see in the pictures below. I'm not sure what it is, but I know it's strong!

More welding projects to come...








-BP

Putting down some nice bead!

By the way, I used to test welding samples back in my engineering days in college. We took the weld samples and cut them into "dog bones". Then we clamped them in special machines and pulled the bones apart until they failed. If it fails outside the weld, it's good i.e. it's stronger than the original metal.

P.S. Destructive testing labs are cool. What a sweet internship that was.

I like the cart that it is on. We made one very similiar to it at work, but we put a chain around one of the support uprights to hold the bottle to the cart as it sat on the bottom shelf. We also made some hooks on the front of the cart to hold the leads, so they weren't having to be wrapped around the box when in storage. Finally we bolted the box to the cart from inside the welder to keep it from falling off the cart when we hit some small stone on the floor in the shop. Now you are ready to make a real race car. Fabrication is mint!!!!!!

I have already bolted it down (the cart had prethreaded holes in it). I do plan to make a little area on the bottom of the cart to hold the bottle and maybe chain or zip tie the bottle in. I also plan to make some hooks to hold my extra stuff. I figured I'd get a little practice in before I started welding to my nice cart. Once I'm done with all that, I'll give it a nice coat of paint.

-BP

Awesome!!! After you get "real good" with your beads - take some and section them - closely inspect the cross sectional shape versus how well you thought it was compared to before you sectioned it. It takes some practice to "read" a weld. MIGs are awesome, but can be decieving at times. Practice makes perfect. Nice machine - no doubt it will serve you very well!!!!!


So skipping ahead - which TIG are you looking at???

Skip the TIG, now that you can put things together, you'll wana to be able to take things apart - PLASMA CUTTER BABY...
I agree with Jason, learn to read the welds. A bad looking weld, i.e. lots of spatter is probably not a good one. The key is -penetration. OK, insert the innuendos here... Seriously, penetration into the parent materiel, is critical. A steady hand, and keeping the wire a uniform distance from the 'puddle' is important too. Practice.

Hay, when can I borrow this??? Just kidding.

Jason - Remember the 'Buzz Box' and 5P rod, and pipe welding?

I remember my welding school at Lincoln Electric (Euclid). It was only then, I realized I didn't wana do this for a living... I didn't like getting burned.

Hey Mark, I absolutely remember my first buzz box - the "standard" Lincoln 225!! I did EVERYTHING with that machine (it's all I had) - I even remember "cutting" steel with it -soak the rods in water!! - crank up the current - and have at it. It was very messy, but it worked - well sorta

However I would NOT trade my TIG for love nor money!!! I use it 99% of the time. Not to detract from a MIG - I still have my MIG and wouldn't get rid of it either - as they all have their place.

Now the plasma - I still don't have one of those either!!!!! Maybe one day. Until then I get by with the old standby - the BLUE WRENCH!!!!

Hey Paul, I can't wait to hear about your first good "burn" story!!! Here's one of mine: I'm under the car, migging up something. Anyways snap crackle pop crackle pop - away I go - all happy and such until a stray red hot ball of molten metal bounces around until it lands DIRECTLY in my EAR!!! Out of pure reaction I zoom my head UP until I crack my forehead on the bottom of the car and then I react by pulling back away until I crack my head back into the concrete floor I was laying on a second earlier!! Some how the perpetual motion of this firedrill subsided and I just lay there LISTENING to the metal cauterize the insides of my ear canal. I was so wedged in place I had no other option than to lay there until the piercing pain subsided. Quite convinced I would be deaf in that ear from now on - I calmly walked into the house and tried to look in the mirror to see how a 4 foot diameter chunk of metal could have actually fit inside my ear - I was rather surprised when I found nothing!! Anyways have I mentioned how I love my TIG - ha ha ha.

Paul not trying to mess with you - just giving you a warning - when under the car - you might want to consider a bandana or something over your ears. I had a full helmet on when this happend, but those tiny balls can jump around more than you think sometimes!!!! Of course I stuck a RED HOT tungsten right thru my glove once as well - so they all have their revenge!!! soon or later!!

Be safe - have fun - practice a BUNCH!!!!!

RacinJacin

I need to start gathering odd bits of metal from work to weld upon for more practice. I'm also going to start some welding on my cart and Trans Am for practice (or for real I guess). So far no burns, but I'm ready for it. I've been burned by other guys welders though...

Maybe eventually I can start to get creative with this thing. I have all sorts of crazy ideas.

-BP

markss327 wrote:It was only then, I realized I didn't wana do this for a living... I didn't like getting burned.

Sounds almost like you were in the stock market.

More welder fun today. I made little brackets to align the gas tank and also some hooks for to hold my welding stuff with.






As the weather breaks, I'll disassemble and paint the cart with a hammer finish.

-BP

Nice welding, but I like the picture of BasementLexi!!