Why is Oxy Acet not good for structural work

[Gary Fowler]

That is exactly why OA welding is not popular today, cost per inch of weld and of course the intense heat is not really labor friendly either. Labor costs contributed to the development of MIG and FCAW welding as it is more cost effective than stick. Stick when thicknesses and material type permit are more cost effective than OA or TIG. TIG is way more cost effective than OA and regardless of what seabees brother in law said, OA is not faster than TIG. Perhaps in the 60's it could have been as TIG was in it infancy at that point and not many welders knew how to weld with TIG. Mostly it was used in the aircraft industry for welding aluminum and magnesium and didnt enjoy much popularity in steel fabrication till early 70's. Prior to that open butt on alloys that couldnt be welded with 6010 electrodes used what was commonly called a "chill ring" which was a backer ring that was placed inside the pipe prior to fitup. You could then weld the root pass with low hydrogen type rods. As the "new " process of TIG became more accepted and cheaper it became widely used and still is today. MIG and FCAW are still not widely accepted in petroleum and refinery application by design and owners due to the bad rep it got when first introduced. Still today, an incorrectly set machine can cause major weld discontinuties that wont be discovered till xray machines take a look. TIG and Stick continue to be the preferred processes for field work with MIG, FCAW and Subarc welding being confined to shop conditions and roll out applications where defects are less likely to occur.

OA still cant be beat for soldering application in lead and zinc which to my knowledge still can only be welded with oxy-acetylene torch. I myself keep a small #1 welding tip for thin stuff that cant be done with stick which is my preferred process. I love to MIG weld, but I just cant justify the $1000 it would cost me to get a good 220volt machine or even to just add a wire feeder to my Miller CC/CV power pack that I use to stick rod with. If my health enabled me to open up a welding shop then things in my shop would be somewhat different including a high-frequency TIG rig for aluminum, a hand held spool gun for MIG aluminum and a good wire feeder for steel.
As it is now with just fixing a few broken things and small projects, OA and SMAW work for me for all issues.

 

[woodlandfarms]

What part of this is about is a few people on the forum have pacemakers and electrical welding is out. I had suggested OA but was told by someone that it is not strong enough compared to electrical. So I guess I was kinda right. If the person in question wants to weld, and has a bit of a deeper pocket, it looks like OA would be a good way to go (With LOTS of practice)

Carl

 

[Dargo]

What part of this is about is a few people on the forum have pacemakers and electrical welding is out. I had suggested OA but was told by someone that it is not strong enough compared to electrical. So I guess I was kinda right. If the person in question wants to weld, and has a bit of a deeper pocket, it looks like OA would be a good way to go (With LOTS of practice)

Carl

I've never welded with it, but I haven't used O/A for cutting anything in almost 10 years. It is far, far less expensive for me to cut outside using O/P. All the scrap yards around here use O/P for cutting as well. If it's clean material and I can get it through a 20' tall door, I am spoiled with my HyperTherm 1250. I even used my 1250 to cut sections of train track to length for weights on my cultipacker.

I know O/P burns slightly cooler than O/A, but in my complete absence of experience, I wonder if it would work? It would help the price issue.

 

[Tractor Seabee]

I've never welded with it, but I haven't used O/A for cutting anything in almost 10 years. It is far, far less expensive for me to cut outside using O/P. All the scrap yards around here use O/P for cutting as well. If it's clean material and I can get it through a 20' tall door, I am spoiled with my HyperTherm 1250. I even used my 1250 to cut sections of train track to length for weights on my cultipacker.

I know O/P burns slightly cooler than O/A, but in my complete absence of experience, I wonder if it would work? It would help the price issue.

O/P works great for cutting, cooler, less slag, and cleaner cut. I believe you have to buy special cutting tips and a regulator and/or adapter, everything else is the same. Never used it myself but have seen it in operation. Propane is much much cheaper than acetelene. It cannot be used for welding steel/iron or other materials that need more heat or the introduction of carbon, like steel requires. Same with MAPP gas, which is almost extinct now. There are even tips to use natural gas. They all work great for soldering, brazing, and heating, again it requires different tips, the mixing orfices and chamber are different due to the different heat value of the gases. A number of years ago a company patented a system for cuttiing steel that used gasoline in a pressurized tank. Saw a demonstration at a trade show and it was amazing. You could hold your hand in the ash stream and it was only warm. No molten particles. They had a 6" shaft they punched a hole through in seconds. The cut was claen enough to weld w/o grinding if you were steady enough. It never caught on, probably too many local fire jurisdictions did not believe all the testing and certifications by NFPA and even the Coast Guard for shipboard.

Yes, OA is expensive, even more so if you have small owned cylinders. A set of cylinders costs more that the welding set. I still use it though sometimes; especially, if I cannot get the arc machine to the work or incidential cutting. I have two sets of cylinders that I have had for years. I found it is easier to learn than arc (that was 60 years ago when it was popular and you generated your own acetelene from carbide and water-cheap but maintenance heavy). Puddle control is the key, let the flame do the work. Was a lot easier to certify with minimal practice. It took me a year of working to certify with arc. I have welded stuff up to 1" thick with it, bevel both sides and multiple passes. That last pass is pretty wide so again puddle control is the key.

Ron

 

[Shield Arc]

MAPP gas is almost extinct now.

Thank God! :laughing:

 

[Farmerford]

Tractor Seabee:

You and I may be the only ones old enough to remember the carbide generators. I recall that ours was a big tank with a smaller tank on top that held the carbide. Turning a handle at the top of the small tank dropped granules of carbide into the large tank which contained water. That is all fuzzy now, but I have a clear memory of flushing the tank to get all the white residue out once the large tank was full. I am sure I never got as good as you, but there are still a few pieces of old OA welded home made machinery around the farm that have not fallen apart (yet).

We could not get an arc welder at the time because we were so far out in the country that the electrical service was not adequate. Seems like they upgraded the lines and we got a new red Lincoln tombstone in the late 1950's. I don't think the OA was ever used again for welding after that.

 

[Tractor Seabee]

Tractor Seabee:

You and I may be the only ones old enough to remember the carbide generators. I recall that ours was a big tank with a smaller tank on top that held the carbide. Turning a handle at the top of the small tank dropped granules of carbide into the large tank which contained water. That is all fuzzy now, but I have a clear memory of flushing the tank to get all the white residue out once the large tank was full. I am sure I never got as good as you, but there are still a few pieces of old OA welded home made machinery around the farm that have not fallen apart (yet).

We could not get an arc welder at the time because we were so far out in the country that the electrical service was not adequate. Seems like they upgraded the lines and we got a new red Lincoln tombstone in the late 1950's. I don't think the OA was ever used again for welding after that.

Farmer

Yeah, those good ole days. I took welding in high school and the first thing we had to learn was operate and maintain the generator and change ox tanks. The generator at the school was outside and was 6' tall and 3' diameter. That white stuff was slacked lime, the voc school I went to; the carpenter class taught plastering also and used the lime from our generator to make plaster. My dad bought a used one several years later (smaller version) at an auction for $5, he could not figure out how to make it work. Used my school experience to dismantle it, clean it and put in operation. We used it for 10 years until carbide was hard to get. If any body cares and asks I will provide the chemistry involved in calcium carbide and acetylene, it is interesting how our industrial processes evolved. Carbide is an interesting product

Ron