a good place to get angle steel??

[Mark @ Everlast]

Panchohughes save that stainless steel for something else! Get your self some mild steel flatbar about 6-inches long, practice lap joints, and fillet welds. Being as you are right handed, try welding from right to left. Also try holding the gun in your right hand like you have been, but place your left hand around the outside of your right hand, with your left forearm on the table.

You need to secure that argon bottle! NOW!

Yep!!! or they will be calling you "rocket man" at your funeral.

A little off topic here as my mind wanders...but does any body remember the episode of the A-Team where BA knocked off ends of oxygen cylinders mounted on a ramp with a sledge hammer and had angle iron ramp and makes a missle?

[Shield Arc]

Mark I never watched the TV show A-Team. But now I know where a couple very good friends of mine got the idea. They got stuck doing maintenance on a gold dredge anchored out in Safety Sound Alaska one winter. Didn't take very long for them to catch up on the list of things to do. Being bored out of their minds they made a bottle launcher, laid oxygen bottles in the launcher and knocked the valves off with a sledge hammer, and watched them skip across the ice.

[panchohughes]

Thanks pancho. Your welds are worlds better than any of mine, and you were on 1/4" plate. My outfit, with gas, hardly gets hot enough for 1/8" and says it can go up to 3/16". Your filming skills could use a little practice - when you held up the plate most times it was off screen. A friend of mine has your same outfit and loves it. Another bud has the 180, I think the biggest if the 110V's, and can do almost anything with it. If I ever can afford to upgrade I'd like to go with the 180. One thing I can suggest, that helped me greatly, is get a self darkening helmet, even a cheap one - helps loads when you can see your work! I saw your other thread and vid of the lights you installed on your BX - looks great, fine job!!

Goood points! I was thinking the same about the auto-darkening helmet... I kept telling myself... "do i really need one for how much welding i do" ? Maybe I will keep an eye on Craigslist and get one on the cheap.

[panchohughes]

Panchohughes save that stainless steel for something else! Get your self some mild steel flatbar about 6-inches long, practice lap joints, and fillet welds. Being as you are right handed, try welding from right to left. Also try holding the gun in your right hand like you have been, but place your left hand around the outside of your right hand, with your left forearm on the table.

You need to secure that argon bottle! NOW!

Thank you sir for the tips! Much appreciated. I don't mean to hi-jack the thread, but if i could ask a quick question? If I switch and weld right to left as you suggest, do I angle the gun away from the direction of travel? Or should I be keeping the gun perpendicular to the welding surface? I guess there are different methods such as push & pull, but for for someone very basic like me, I think i am "pulling" the puddle. If I change direction, and don't change tip angle, would i be 'pushing' ?
Thanks for the heads up on the argon bottle. I need to get a cart for my rig with a bottle holder & chain. I will do that tomorrow. Thanks again.

[Shield Arc]

Thank you sir for the tips! Much appreciated. I don't mean to hi-jack the thread, but if i could ask a quick question? If I switch and weld right to left as you suggest, do I angle the gun away from the direction of travel? Or should I be keeping the gun perpendicular to the welding surface? I guess there are different methods such as push & pull, but for for someone very basic like me, I think i am "pulling" the puddle. If I change direction, and don't change tip angle, would i be 'pushing' ?
Thanks for the heads up on the argon bottle. I need to get a cart for my rig with a bottle holder & chain. I will do that tomorrow. Thanks again.

You know really there are no rules, you have to know how to weld in all directions. I'm right handed, but can weld with either hand. But generally I hold everything in my right hand, with anything that produces slag I'll travel left to right. With Mig I prefer to go right to left. Do your self a big favor and learn to go in all directions. But just try going right to left.
Here is a good chart on the subject.

[joshuabardwell]

You are pulling the puddle if the electrode is tilted toward the direction of travel. When pulling, the electrode is pointed back toward the bead that is being laid down.

You are pushing the puddle if the electrode is tilted away from the direction of travel. When pushing, the electrode is pointed forwards, toward the joint that has not yet been welded.

Whether to push or pull depends mainly on what welding process you're using. As I understand it, stick is almost always pulled, whereas TIG is usually pushed. I don't know about MIG. The reason stick is pulled (again, as I understand it) is that you want the arc force to be pushing the slag back away from the puddle. With gas-shielded processes, this is unnecessary, since there isn't any slag.

The angle that should be used is independent of what hand is holding the gun. When pulling, it is usually easiest for left-handed people to go right-to-left, and vice versa for right-handed people. When pushing, it's opposite. The reason is that these configurations keep your hand and arm out of the sight-line to the puddle. Going the other way tends to put the hand, gun, or electrode in the way of the puddle, making it harder to see what's going on. Of course, a skilled weldor should be able to work around this, because there are always going to be some situations where you have to move with the puddle partially obscured.

EDIT TO ADD: I think another reason people tend to work a certain direction depending on their handedness is that it's always easier to work "inside" your body vs. "across" your body. This is the same reason a forehand shot is easier in tennis than a backhand shot: because with a backhand, you're reaching across your own body. The same is true if you are left-handed, and are working left-to-right with a pull technique. The degree to which you're crossing your own body is less than with a backhand, but still, your left arm is extended towards your center-line, and then your wrist is cocked to hold the gun to the left, while pulling the bead from left to right. You're crossing your own center-line and then back again. Your elbow gets in tight to your body and you lose flexibility.

[Shield Arc]

Of course, a skilled weldor should be able to work around this, because there are always going to be some situations where you have to move with the puddle partially obscured.

And sometimes you just have to go by sound.

[panchohughes]

............The same is true if you are left-handed, and are working left-to-right with a pull technique. The degree to which you're crossing your own body is less than with a backhand, but still, your left arm is extended towards your center-line, and then your wrist is cocked to hold the gun to the left, while pulling the bead from left to right. You're crossing your own center-line and then back again. Your elbow gets in tight to your body and you lose flexibility.

Wow. I had to read that post a couple of times and then do some 'phantom' welds here on my desk. Thanks for the post! Makes sense. As Sheild suggested - I will practice both techniques with both arms.

[joshuabardwell]

And sometimes you just have to go by sound.

What???

[Shield Arc]

What???

I listen to a weld being made just about as much as I watch it being made. Sometimes you can't finish a weld by seeing it, you have to finish the weld by hearing what it is doing. Trust me, you build enough things you'll get into this situation.