welding question

RiverRat88

RiverRat88

Active Member
Joined
Jun 1, 2009
Location
raleigh NC
I have never used a flux core welder before and the welds just don't look like they are coming out quite right. I just wanted to check and see if all this splatter was normal and make sure I am getting good enough penetration.
cheap 90amp 110v flux core welder

1/4" plate welded to the top of 3/16"x2x4 box before cleaning up

after cleaning up

If anyone could help me with this it would be much appreciated
chris
 
that is quite a bit of splatter. try burning a little colder and run a little slower. I haven't stick welded in a few years but I find slow to be good. Also be very aware of angle changes in the rod as you burn it down, you want to maintain the same angle and arc length
 
I might should have been a little more specific. It is a wire feed flux core welder, I have two voltage settings min and max, and ten wire speeds with it currently set at max voltage with wire speed on 7. The welder is rated for 3/16 max thickness and I am using it on 3/16 and 1/4 thick metal.
 
ha sorry i should learn to read. im not too familiar with the wire feed flux core. i would think the same theory applies though
 
I'd turn the wire speed down and move the gun more slowly. On my Lincoln 135 I usually burn in 3/16 and 1/4 plate on the highest voltage (D or 4) and the wire speed around 2.5 to 3.5 out of 10. With flux core you'll get more spatter than with gas shielded solid wire but what you have seems excessive. Take this with a grain of salt though cause I'm no professional welder, maybe someone with more experience will chime in soon.

The higher the voltage and slower the wirespeed/ gun movement the greater your penetration will be.
 
Did you grind the paint off the hitch before welding? Doesn't look like it...
Clean metal welds better than dirty metal!

Also, to check penetration, weld to piece of scrap (similar to what you're working on) and then cut them in half. You're definitely maxing that machine out welding 1/4 to 3/16's, may want to think about grinding some bevels and using multiple passes if it will be seeing any significant forces.
 
I did grind the paint off just barely past the edge of the welds, this part will not see any significant force. I made sure to ask before making it to any important part, I.will try a scrap piece and hopefully there is decent penetration. Which I may take a picture of the cross-section just to be sure.
Thanks for all the replies.
 
Let me be the first to say: Your biggest problem is the welder. I'm speaking from experience, that thing is a horrible welder, and a marginal boat anchor at best. I ditched mine for a Lincoln Weld-pac 100 and that made a HUGE difference. I was actually able to stick metal together reliably and consistantly! You don't need gas, but you do need a decent welder before you keep going. That welder was never designed for the thicknesses you're trying to weld, and you're going to produce weak joints. I wouldn't use it on ANYTHING critical or suspension-related. I know you don't want to hear that, but it's the sad truth. Horrible Freight should be outlawed from selling that welder. It's dangerous.
 
I was kinda thinking that myself, I was hoping to be able to use it for the tire carrier and get a real welder or atleast access to one again before the summer, before doing any suspension work. But I may need to do that first, I guess I will check the penetration and go from there. I didn't expect much from a $80 welder but was hoping to make it work. Atleast I can still do interior panels with it since that was my initial purpose anyway.
 
I have this same welder i use on bupers and such....Turn wire speed down to 3.5 or 4 on max. Make sure to hook your ground as close to where you are welding as possible and grind that area clean and make sure ground clamp is corrosion free also (not a good ground clamp at all). Push the weld in a circle or "e" shape and it does a good job for me. The thickest I've with succes is a set of 16 ton d-ring shackles to 3/16 bumper i built for 704eric here on the forum and it held up to jonnyb jerking him off little kodak this week end after he high centered his rig. This welder can do a good job for you, takes good metal prep and alot of patience/practice to get it right, you will have a good bit of spatter with the welder just bc of what it is. hope this helps
 
Alot of time you can pick up a lincoln stick welder on craigslist for around $150 and man they will do a lot thicker material up to half inch. I have with those welders like your using heated the material with a torch first to get the weld to penetrate and hold better but like the others said the welder has alot to say for the weld. Duty cycle on one of those welders isn't real good and the power changes constantly and makes it hard to get a great weld. Just my experience of welding for 26 yrs now in maintenance field.
 
I hit a deer with the daily driver and am in the process of drilling out the spot welds of the radiator support so I can change it out. I was thinking about buying this same welder to weld the spot welds back.

Would it be better on the thinner metal?

RiverRat-interested in "renting" it.
 
NO! It's atrocious on thin metal. Flux core burns hotter and digs deeper by nature, so it's already a bad choice for light gauge. Then you're also using a horrible welder with poor voltage regulation. It just doesn't go low enough to do a good job without a lot of hassle. I've done it, and it wasn't fun. You spend a lot of time chasing holes.
 
Flux core wire will out preform standard hard wire with gas in many highly contaminated base material welding processes. Many of the wires are available with elements in the fluxing agent that deals with and helps penetrate mill scale, rust, and light oils. This is much like many stick electrodes that are designed to do jobs out in the field with very little prep work involved. Many sub contractors prefer larger flux core wire fed machines to do onsite jobs that require alot of material to be put down in substandard conditions with very little prep time. I've used flux core wire on beams in the past to help production on heavily scaled beams and structural iron. Flux core by nature requires more filler to be put down and higher feed rates to alow the flux to properly shield the weld pool and get some filler down. Properly tuned the machine will produce minimal splatter outside the well pool and will hiss much like a 7018 when being put in properly. The flux should roll off very evenly and is best welded in the backhand method with very little manipulation of the weld pool, ie: weaving, drawing circles, back stepping.......
Your number one proplem is the welder. And in general the fact that all manufactures push this type of filler wire on novice users with small machines with poor duty cycles. Flux of any type requires a consistent output of heat; in this case the arc, to flow out and create the shielding gases as it is consumed. The heat source (your particular welder) is extremely marginal at best.
Short welds with plenty of surface prep and pre beveling is the only way to get this unit to do much. Look at your duty cycle. If its posted. Stay within its ranges if possible. It probably is only around 30% at 3/4 to half its rated output, so if your always on the extreme end of the welding settings you get standard poor performance for 3 minutes out of 10 at best. Then it just gets worse from then on.
If you like the idea of no gas, very little surface prep and weld thickness from 14ga to 1/2 plate get a SMAW welder. (sheilded metal arc welder or stick to most). AC machines will out perform this unit all day long.
 
Thanks for the insight, Warrior! Unfortunately, I don't think it's going to deter many folks from making the $100 mistake of buying this welder. I learned a few things, though. I haven't worked with innercore at work yet, but my supplier told me it would help with deposition in large fillet welds where multiple passes and a large profile were required. That's about all I knew about it. I'd like to play with it someday, though.
 
I don't want to hijack this thread but:

Would the brand name 110v welders be better? Since flux core wire is hotter, would it be OK for sheet metal? I'll end up with about 40 spot welds or so but I don't have a shop and the car is outside. My mig skills are better than my stick skills.
 
Find somebody with a 110 Lincoln or Hobart or something with a bottle of gas and some .023 wire. Rent it. You'll thank yourself later. Hell, .030 would be better than flux for this. Flux is great for plate, but I don't like it on sheet, and it's harder to clean up.
 
WARRIORWELDING said:
Flux core wire will out preform standard hard wire with gas in many highly contaminated base material welding processes. Many of the wires are available with elements in the fluxing agent that deals with and helps penetrate mill scale, rust, and light oils. This is much like many stick electrodes that are designed to do jobs out in the field with very little prep work involved. Many sub contractors prefer larger flux core wire fed machines to do onsite jobs that require alot of material to be put down in substandard conditions with very little prep time. I've used flux core wire on beams in the past to help production on heavily scaled beams and structural iron. Flux core by nature requires more filler to be put down and higher feed rates to alow the flux to properly shield the weld pool and get some filler down. Properly tuned the machine will produce minimal splatter outside the well pool and will hiss much like a 7018 when being put in properly. The flux should roll off very evenly and is best welded in the backhand method with very little manipulation of the weld pool, ie: weaving, drawing circles, back stepping.......
Your number one proplem is the welder. And in general the fact that all manufactures push this type of filler wire on novice users with small machines with poor duty cycles. Flux of any type requires a consistent output of heat; in this case the arc, to flow out and create the shielding gases as it is consumed. The heat source (your particular welder) is extremely marginal at best.
Short welds with plenty of surface prep and pre beveling is the only way to get this unit to do much. Look at your duty cycle. If its posted. Stay within its ranges if possible. It probably is only around 30% at 3/4 to half its rated output, so if your always on the extreme end of the welding settings you get standard poor performance for 3 minutes out of 10 at best. Then it just gets worse from then on.
If you like the idea of no gas, very little surface prep and weld thickness from 14ga to 1/2 plate get a SMAW welder. (sheilded metal arc welder or stick to most). AC machines will out perform this unit all day long.
Click to expand...


Great welding tech, I've been running innershield with C02 at work for better than 15yr. This stuff will really burn in. Especially in the vertical up.
 
Its great for that kind of application, have you noticed the puddle "freezes" or cools without drooping out like standard hardwire. Thats another reason its seems to pile up on lower output substandard machines. Seems to me the wire manufactures make a good product so the mickey mouse companies try to reverse engineer a cheap "affordable" welder to run the product.

Like various stick electrodes made specific to conditions and welding positions inner shield, hollow core or flux core can be engineered and purchased to do different things. Check your wire code numbers on your box. I'd like to decode it and see what it's welding and mechanical properties are.

Another good process for the type of large deposited fills catfish was discribing is semi automatic or automatic submerged arc welding. You lay down powdered flux and then feed a very large diameter wire through it and the weld takes place under the powdered flux. You can literally whatch it without a very dark lens. The weld and the flux hardens, chip flux and your done. Some flux is even recycled reprocessed and reused. Very large plate and surface welding can be carried out this way. I watched a ribbon welder put down a 3 by 1/2 thick pass of weld for wear surfacing at a facility who makes filler for military applications using submerged arc.
 
I've run the submerged acr before. We had miller come in for a demo, pretty cool.

The freezing is awsome, hands down the best wire for out of position. I like the Large amount of deposition during over head & vertical up work. Mostly we run it because of this & the small amount off spatter. It is a different animal then standard mig welding though. I've trained a lot of 20 yr plus exp welders. Not that they were not skilled just didn't know the characteristics of the puddle & the key hole appearance the you get .
 
what do ya'll build where you are employed? Stuctural Steel jobs or something more specific?
 
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