VRaptor Has New Equipment :-)

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

20240228_124615.jpg

I have a long ways to go in the learning process, but this is something I probably should have purchased a decade ago. There have been dozens of times I wished I could weld aluminum to simplify the designs of parts. The part shown is an overhead 2-gauge pod to locate 2 gauges up on the halo bar in front of the driver.

[JohnK]

Nice! Is that Al MIG? I recently purchased a multi-process welder to learn to weld, and it can do Al MIG and Al TIG, though I haven't played with either one yet.

[dhanisch]

Nice. Out of all of my various equipment my TIG welder is one of my favorites. Aluminum has a steep learning curve, but keep at it. Once you learn the right settings, speed, etc., it gets much easier.

[Power Surge]

Practice practice practice. And you'll be laying dimes in no time.

Btw I sent you an email about parts a week or so ago.

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

Practice practice practice. And you'll be laying dimes in no time.

Btw I sent you an email about parts a week or so ago.

Dang....looks like my spam filter has been working overtime? Sorry about that! I've got to go on an all-day parts run tomorrow....so it will probably be Friday before I get back to you on your order!

Yeah....practice is right!....I can get a super nice looking weld and it seems everything is just going perfect......and then my next weld it seems I forgot everything and it's a disaster. Feeding the rod with my left hand is probably my #1 problem.....serious lack of LH coordination.

Yes, it is TIG.

[dhanisch]

Dang....looks like my spam filter has been working overtime? Sorry about that! I've got to go on an all-day parts run tomorrow....so it will probably be Friday before I get back to you on your order!

Yeah....practice is right!....I can get a super nice looking weld and it seems everything is just going perfect......and then my next weld it seems I forgot everything and it's a disaster. Feeding the rod with my left hand is probably my #1 problem.....serious lack of LH coordination.

Yes, it is TIG.

I use this for the filler rod sometimes. Really helps me.

Blue Demon DAB PEN-TIG Filler, aid, made in USA https://a.co/d/3zfDLBi

[lance corsi]

I like to weld, so let me chime in here. When welding aluminum, fit your parts as close as possible, this makes life a lot easier. Use a dedicated stainless steel bristled brush to clean off any corrosion or oxidation. Aluminum isn’t easy to weld and doesn’t exactly align with what you may know about welding steel. Don’t weld dirty, if you accidentally dip your tungsten, take the time to break off the affected tip and re-ball the end. On thin pieces I use a 1/16 pure tungsten electrode. Match your filler rod to the type of base metal you are welding on. Some filler rods are more malleable than others. Don’t try to use too large diameter filler rod. On 1/16 aluminum I use a 1/16 filler rod. Maintain a close arc length, but not so close that the aluminum is drawn up into your cup. If the weld area begins to cave in, stop briefly and let it cool a bit. Try to maintain an angle of attack of about 45 degrees with your torch and MOVE! Don’t dwell in a spot as this only complicates your life. Don’t get nervous. I find that when I’ve spent lots of time fabricating the pieces, I get nervous and this usually ends badly. Tell yourself that this is just another part, not to worry. Try to start your weld at an intersection where two corners meet, as this is easier than ending where two parts meet. Corners melt easier than large sections. It’s ok to move the stinger back and forth to heat both parts simultaneously. Aluminum “bridges” so don’t try to get inside corners to fully fill. It’s different from steel in this aspect. Use a/c current with high frequency. I use a Miller 250HF which has a no-touch start, so this helps keep your tungsten clean. I also use pure argon as a shielding gas for welding aluminum. I’ve learned these tidbits through watching tutorials on YouTube and trial and error, which I must say have been many. Clean your area to be welded with acetone before starting. That’s about it other than practice, practice, practice. On my build you can see my progressive improvement so don’t be ashamed of your first tries.
Good luck with it and I hope this helps a bit.

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

I use this for the filler rod sometimes. Really helps me.

Blue Demon DAB PEN-TIG Filler, aid, made in USA https://a.co/d/3zfDLBi

That looks like something that would really help me! If I just grab the filler rod and advance it by moving my hand toward the weld, I do fine....but once I run out of room to move my hand any farther, I get into trouble. Trying to feed the rod by using my fingers to slide the rod thru my hand is a disaster. I'm either jamming the rod into the tungsten or to the side of the pool where it gets stuck to the plate or I get so distracted by trying to figure out how to get more filler rod thru my fingers that I forget what my right hand is doing and dip the tungsten or stop moving the torch and the next thing I know I have a pool the size of a nickel.

Thanks for the link....I did not know that anything like that existed!

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

I like to weld, so let me chime in here. When welding aluminum, fit your parts as close as possible, this makes life a lot easier. Use a dedicated stainless steel bristled brush to clean off any corrosion or oxidation. Aluminum isn’t easy to weld and doesn’t exactly align with what you may know about welding steel. Don’t weld dirty, if you accidentally dip your tungsten, take the time to break off the affected tip and re-ball the end. On thin pieces I use a 1/16 pure tungsten electrode. Match your filler rod to the type of base metal you are welding on. Some filler rods are more malleable than others. Don’t try to use too large diameter filler rod. On 1/16 aluminum I use a 1/16 filler rod. Maintain a close arc length, but not so close that the aluminum is drawn up into your cup. If the weld area begins to cave in, stop briefly and let it cool a bit. Try to maintain an angle of attack of about 45 degrees with your torch and MOVE! Don’t dwell in a spot as this only complicates your life. Don’t get nervous. I find that when I’ve spent lots of time fabricating the pieces, I get nervous and this usually ends badly. Tell yourself that this is just another part, not to worry. Try to start your weld at an intersection where two corners meet, as this is easier than ending where two parts meet. Corners melt easier than large sections. It’s ok to move the stinger back and forth to heat both parts simultaneously. Aluminum “bridges” so don’t try to get inside corners to fully fill. It’s different from steel in this aspect. Use a/c current with high frequency. I use a Miller 250HF which has a no-touch start, so this helps keep your tungsten clean. I also use pure argon as a shielding gas for welding aluminum. I’ve learned these tidbits through watching tutorials on YouTube and trial and error, which I must say have been many. Clean your area to be welded with acetone before starting. That’s about it other than practice, practice, practice. On my build you can see my progressive improvement so don’t be ashamed of your first tries.
Good luck with it and I hope this helps a bit.

Thanks for the detailed post!! So far, I've done really well on the "cleanliness" part. The only time I get in trouble there is if there's a long pause between welding (while I'm grinding my tungsten every 2 minutes (see post above ) and I don't purge the gas before I get going again and that it seems that the pre-flow gas isn't quite enough to get all of the air purged from the hose in time and I end up with a black spatter during the initial arc. I've since increased my pre-flow time a bit to help with that.

I've watched HOURS of youtube videos and they have helped tremendously. My very first try......just pushing the pool across a piece of .080" alum went absolutely perfectly. I was so happy and thought to myself, "Gee, this isn't going to be nearly as hard as I thought!" Same thing with my first attempt at just pushing a pool across the metal and adding the filler rod. My first attempt was a bit on the cold side with a very high profile and little penetration, but it actually looked really nice and consistent. I slowed down a bit on my second attempt and made a perfect pass that looked every bit as good as anything I had seen on the Youtube "how to get started TIG" videos. Wow.....this isn't going to be nearly as hard as I thought! Then I grabbed a new cool piece of aluminum and tried again.......and it was a total disaster. Yes....I think panic plays a huge role in this. Instead of just "doing it", I think I'm over-thinking things and get caught up in chasing one of the 3 inputs at a time.....I see it getting too hot so I back off the pedal a little. While I'm concentrating on backing off of the pedal, I forget to move the torch and the pool just gets hotter and grows bigger....and while I'm fighting between moving the torch with my right hand and getting the heat right with my foot, I forget to add filler rod with my left hand and it spirals out of control....

[beeman]

Cool new toy, Shane. It will really expand your build options. One thing to watch for, make sure your welder itself isn't too close to where you are working, the cooling fan will blow away your shielding gas even if you can't feel the breeze.

[crash]

Hey Shane.

I am self taught also. 20 years ago I bought my first tig machine and just "went for it".

Good tips here. I believe I agree with all of them.

I will add that I find it very helpful to pre heat the part before welding. This not only brings the whole part closer to the welding temperature, but it also gets rid of moisture. You will be amazed at what you see when you preheat with a propane torch!

Also, I clean my rod with alcohol or acetone as well as cleaning the part.

If you weld stainless, get the Solar Flux for the back side of the welds. Much easier than purging.

[beeman]

Mike, what thickness aluminum do you consider preheating? I'm assuming not thin?

[lance corsi]

I preheat when the weldment is say 1/4” thick and consists of multiple pieces. A couple things I’ve had to preheat are a 12” aluminum disc for a disc/belt sander I built, and my air/water intercooler but I did the intercooler on a 2 burner hot plate I have just for such things.
I think my biggest problem when learning was nerves. If making a weld on the bottom of an object, no problem but when I began on the top in-your-face welds, it looked like someone else did it! It really is an art and I constantly strive for that “perfect” bead but rarely achieve it.

[J R Jones]

I have not seen reference to respirator use, welding fumes are bad for lungs. The weld-respirator creates a problem for me. I require magnifiers and indeed I have a strong prescription for welding and lay-outs. The mask causes my glasses to fog, obvious consequence. So I hold my breath which does not last long enough.
I often have dissimilar gages to TIG weld, and small parts welded to big parts. That requires prioritized heating. I get the greater mass hot first, then the lesser mass. When I achieve balanced heat, I make the bead and add filler.
Two other practices, I occasionally need strong background lighting to see the area ahead and behind the bead as I weld.
Comfort and articulation are vital for me. I keep a variety of wood blocks to stack as wrist/arm supports to provide a steady torch. Welding non-flat items result in repositioning for weld segments. Going free-arm is hard for precise torch positioning.
I do a lot of stainless and I have stainless and mild steel wire for the MIG. I often tack parts together with the MIG before TIG welding. Straight TIG can distort flat parts and assemblies.
jim

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

So far, the only thing I've practiced on is the .080" alum since that's about 95% of what I normally use to make various parts from. Yes, I did make sure that the welder fan is not blowing on my material and have had no issues with "dirty" welds like the gas is getting blown away. Yes, I'm cleaning all of my parts as well as the rods with alcohol before use. I haven't tried stainless yet, but plan to in the future.......right now I'm trying to stick to one thing at a time until I get a better feel for what I'm doing.

What I have to figure out is how I can weld a really nice looking bead with perfect penetration on a new, cold piece of alum......

20240301_133612.jpg

And then grab a new cold piece of alum and try to repeat the exact same thing and end up with absolute destruction like this:

20240301_134545.jpg

Again, I think a lot of this comes back to panic. If I can get a good start and keep the torch moving and keep the rod feeding, everything goes well. The second that I see that one factor is "getting away from me", I panic and everything just goes to sh!t and I can't figure out how to recover and get back to a good bead. Instead of just stopping and starting over, I try to make adjustments to "get back to a good bead" and it never works and instead just spirals farther and farther out of control.

[J R Jones]

Another thing I experienced recently: Welding irregular shapes together requires desperate fixturing and grounding. That can take longer than the welding.
I have magnet blocks for holding ferrous parts in place for welding. If the magnet is too close to the weld bead, the flame goes berserk.
BTW I use pure tungsten for AL and 2% for mild steel. I have used DC for brazing.
I never have weld gas issues with the TIG, the (Miller) seals are great. My Hobart MIG gun requires a gas purge if the gas has been off for an hour or more. Unload the wire drive and pull the trigger to fill the hose. My older Miller 260 had a two stage trigger on the gun for gas before power. That worked well for before and after gas.
jim

[crash]

I started out only pre heating different thickness materials. Then pre heating when the shop was pretty cold. Now I pre heat pretty much everything that is aluminum. I almost always see moisture that is evaporated off the surface of the part when it is cold. This was a surprise to me. I figure that there is no downside to preheating, so why not do it?

Oh, and if you are building tanks, pressurized or not, pressure test them in a water tank. I don't think I have ever built a tank that was 100% leak free on the first go round.

[Shoeless]

Cool new toy, Shane. It will really expand your build options. One thing to watch for, make sure your welder itself isn't too close to where you are working, the cooling fan will blow away your shielding gas even if you can't feel the breeze.

Was welding a bunch of stainless to learn my Prime Weld machine and just couldn't figure out why one weld was great and then when I went to the real parts later it went to crap. Oh you mean that fan pointing at me will screw up my shielding gas LOL

[frankenford]

Shane you might try the CK layzre tungsten. I've dipped these in the puddle many times and seen the puddle not contaminate it and be able to just keep going. I know that when I started id have to grind 10 blue tungstens to be able to get 10 minutes of welding in because of how often I dipped in the puddle or hit it with my filler rod

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

Shane you might try the CK layzre tungsten. I've dipped these in the puddle many times and seen the puddle not contaminate it and be able to just keep going. I know that when I started id have to grind 10 blue tungstens to be able to get 10 minutes of welding in because of how often I dipped in the puddle or hit it with my filler rod

That's exactly what I'm using right now. I used the tungsten that came with the welder (blue) when I started, and I have noticed quite a few times since I switched to the layzre tungsten that I know I dipped the tungsten and I look at it and it looks perfectly fine? Not sure how that works....but I'll take it!

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

20240322_094311.jpg

I'm sure not going to win any beauty contests yet.....but I think I'm making a little progress?

[frankenford]

That's pretty good actually. It's not fair to compare yourself to a machine or someone that welds 8 hrs a day for the last 20 years. What machine did you get? I think blue the blue works better when over 140a or so but other than that the layzre tungsten has produced my best looking welds. The CK gas saver lense kit helped me alot as well. Pretty much everything I've got from CK has been an upgrade to what I got with the welder.

[crash]

As I was welding yesterday, I noted that I don't think anyone mentioned this...get a flexible head torch. I really don't know how I would weld without this. I went over to a buddies shop awhile back and he wanted me to TIG some stuff for him. He did not have a flexible torch and I felt very handicapped after using the flexible model for years now. It makes it so much easier to get into tight spots. I think the one I have is the Weldcraft W-20?

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

That's pretty good actually. It's not fair to compare yourself to a machine or someone that welds 8 hrs a day for the last 20 years. What machine did you get? I think blue the blue works better when over 140a or so but other than that the layzre tungsten has produced my best looking welds. The CK gas saver lense kit helped me alot as well. Pretty much everything I've got from CK has been an upgrade to what I got with the welder.

Thanks! After watching tons of Youtube videos, I ended up getting the Vulcan ProTIG 205 from Harbor Freight. Not having anything to compare it to, it seems like a really nice machine to me....and I didn't watch a single review of it online where the reviewer wasn't surprised at how nice it was and how well it worked.

[VRaptor SpeedWorks, LLC]

As I was welding yesterday, I noted that I don't think anyone mentioned this...get a flexible head torch. I really don't know how I would weld without this. I went over to a buddies shop awhile back and he wanted me to TIG some stuff for him. He did not have a flexible torch and I felt very handicapped after using the flexible model for years now. It makes it so much easier to get into tight spots. I think the one I have is the Weldcraft W-20?

Yeah....I've already ran into stuff where I wished for a flex-head torch. I'll probably have to pick one up at some point down the road.