cami

I don't use it now but I used to sometimes stick a Tiger Torch into a scrap of pipe; it made a nice little radiant heater. Did a little work on a site where they tarped everything up and had a couple Herman Nelsons going...nice and toasty.

@ChrisP: Welding rods are engineered to be used a certain way and if you use them in a way that's not intended, you can't make guarantees. When scabbing things together, anything goes, but I generally say no to customers with scab jobs. Jabbing a (second) rod into your puddle will cool and shrink it, and it's something I'll do when doing OAW or GTAW, but with those processes it can be done without deviating from common practices. I have never seen a SMAW weld procedure that called for dipping in a second rod and would question judgement of a professional welder who did it on a job. Speaking generally about something like heat control with SMAW, there are choices that allow you to use the process as it was intended. Depending what you're doing, backer strips, heat sinks, back stitching, or smaller rods might work for you. These have all worked for me at different times but most of the time, what works for me, is to weld downhand using 6010 with the lowest current I can get away with. As for comfort, it can make a big difference in weld quality; especially if you're doing it all day, every day. I don't have time for prima donnas but there's no point in making things harder than they need to be.

I sometimes light an open fire outside my shop. What't nice is my welder is driven by an old Wisconsin engine. The cooling fan's output is directed by shrowds over the engine and blows out one side. I'll put it by my bay door with the exhaust pointed outside and the cooling fan output blowing in; it takes the chill off so long as there's welding to be done.

I heard that the old-timers just dipped their rods in paint to keep the flux intact and a fellow on the surface just used a knife switch to cut the power when the diver wasn't actually welding; cavemen. I've thought of trying to lay some beads in a water trough at the shop, but have been too busy to mess around. I've dunked 6010 in water and ran it with hight current to do come scabby emergency cutting....how much underwater welding "street cred" is that worth? :)

Welding with two electrodes like that? Just say no. If you want to lay more pounds of steel in an hour then try a larger rod, try a fast fill rod (like 7024) if you can, or find a suitcase welder and run wire. Welding rods are engineered to be used a certain way and if you change that, you can't make guarantees. Oh, is this a soap box I'm standing on? Before today I've only heard of this stick-TIG techniques in tall tales told of great welders in days gone by. Usually there's a story about the same fellow taking a stinger in each hand and doing the root pass on both sides of a pipe simultaneously. I think in one version, he stuck a broom up his rear end and swept up his work area while he did it ;)

Things get quite coldon account of the temperature drop of the shielding gas going through the regulator. While that shielding gas is very dry, the air outside isn't; remember that one side of that diaphragm is in contact with the atmosphere. I don't know what's up with your regulator, but for chattering regulators I will turn the flow rate up high then bring it back down to where it should be; that usually does the job. For freezing, I hang a trouble light right on the regulator and put a small cardboard box over top; I have an extra work light just for warming regulators.

Oxy-acetylene torches are great for some sorts of heat treatment work. The intense heat lets you really control things. The drawback is that as far as heating methods go, it's expensive. I've never even thought to use a plumber's torch to harden anything but often use one for drawing a temper on small pieces when I don't feel like dragging out the larger torches. Just today I was re-doing a few short chisels with parker taper shanks on them. The torch allowed me to re-treat the working ends without putting any heat into the shanks; it also let me handle the work with bare hands.

In addition to crap in the castings, aluminum used in casting is often alloyed with Zinc to help it flow into the forms better; you might notice a more "liquid" puddle. For general repair of aluminum with a torch, I braze, or braze weld it with Alladin 3-in-1; it's a nice product.

Is it just me, or is the second half of a cigar not nearly as good as the first?

Make yourself a cyclonic air/water separator....or at least a drop/low spot to catch the moisture. Plumb a line into the bottom of the separator/low spot that comes out to a valve at ground level; give 'er a crank and let that compressed air do the work of bringing the moisture to the surface.

The official line is that you should lift a file off of the work on the back-stroke. You WILL kill your files in short order if you apply pressure on the back-stroke. I've always removed any pressure and just gently dragged file over the work when pulling it back. I find it easier to start the next stroke quickly this way as I don't need to worry about putting the file back against the work too hard if I'm going fast; I'm happy with how long my files last. As for sharpening...Files last so long and are so cheap it's hardly seems worrth the effort to me.

Regarding charred cloth: Once you char cloth it seems to light up much more easily after that.

I saw a fellow post a video in another area and reminded me of a great old Buster Keaton silent film called The Blacksmith. If you're in the mood for some stupidity then this is the ticket..

Depending on the joint prep and included angle (the total angle produced by the two chamfers on the plate ends) it can make for a fairly wide opening at the top of the plate....and of course, the thicker the plate, the wider the opening will be at the top. I've never worked in a shipyard so I can't speak first-hand but wherever I've done work with heavy plate, my value to the boss was determined by how many pounds of weld deposit were made each day. You run wire whenever you can; the thickest you can manage. If you can't get a wirefeeder where you are, then you use the thickest rods you can manage. I've had a a former co-worker and a former employer who were both former shipyard welders and one thing that came up in lunchroom conversations was what a hack-job it could be sometimes. As for filling the big grooves, I recall one of those fellows saying he used 1/16" wire. There was an equipment manufacturer in Nanaimo who used 3/32" flux core wire. I know a few guys that worked there and two have commented on how the fat wire made quick work of big welds. Where I worked we only ran 1/16" wire...not exactly gigantic but you could still build welds fairly quickly.

Cut a scrap of plate or flat bar into an L. Weld one end to your base so it stands upside-down and weld a nut to the other end; add some threaded rod and you have a clamp. It's cheap and you're not dealing with mystery metal. Depending on a few things, you might end up shrinking the nut a bit; I've run into this but it was nothing a quick pass with a tap or homemade thread-chaser(much cheaper than a tap if it's a monster nut) couldn't fix.

Yeah, they do look nice. In photo 17265 it looks like you had a little undercut on the left edge of the cap; near the top. It also looked like there was a low spot in the middle of the cap near the bottom of your weld; these two things might give you a little trouble. Don't get me wrong, you have two welds to be proud of, but I don't know how strict your inspectors are. Once I failed a test because of a similar little flaw. In British Columbia, for the type of welding you're talking about, they would perform bend tests on coupons cut from them. Over here we usually prepare the coupons ourselves for the inspector to bend. Standing by the press as your weld coupons are being bent can make a fellow anxious but at least you don't have to wait too long to get the results! The shipyards up here pay good money, but it's often a case of feast or famine. Is it the same where you are? Irnsrgn, I've got a story for you: ***disclaimer: I've never worked in a power plant so all of my words on the subject are second-hand. *** A friend of a friend (honest!) trained to do a specific weld in a reactor in Canada. Each welder was paired with a spotter, who made sure the welder didn't keep any part of themselves in a dangerous spot for too long, and spent weeks practicing in their suits with a mock-up of the joint. When his turn came at the reactor, he got himself into position. His spotter told him to pull one of his knees back, so he did. His spotter then told him that one of his shoulders needed to move, so he pulled it back. Just as he was ready to strike his arc, he was told that his time was up and to get out. All that work and no weld! As for welding standards that apply to nuclear facilities in Canada, I'm told that they're very simple: zero defects. It's such a serious business that I'm guessing the same applies in any part of the world. Depending what the pipe is carying, you'd be surprised how lax the standards can be. There's a reactor at Delft University, and I've been around the campus...does that qualify me for anything?

What's a low voltgage rod?

Thoughts on 7018..... These rods are very hygroscopic: For any critical applications I never take more than I can use in a couple hours; leave the rest in the oven. Follow re-bake procedures for rods left out and toss any that actually get wet. If it's good steel that you're welding then it's not too big of a deal....but let the engineers worry about that. The stuff I do in my backyard is a different matter..... I've heard of companies that were allowed to put rods into sealed canisters to take to the job site but once a rep. from the Canadian Welding Bureau was doing a compliance check where I was working and told us he wanted rod ovens installed on all of our trucks. Sheesh! As for preheat, don't bother unless the procedures call for it or the steel is wet. Just a quick pass with a torch to drive off condensation is fine. Regarding the direction of travel for vertical welds: It's structural, right? Follow the procedure you're qualified for and that the engineer specified. Are you doing job tests on site? Any procedure tests I've done were up-hand weldng. There is a prequalified welding procedure for pipe on the books in British Columbia that's 6010/11 downhand but I've never seen anything formal regarding downhand welding with 7018. I weld a lot of stuff downhand; in fact, whenever I can. It's fast so there's less heat input (if that's an issue) but that speed doesn't give you the time you have when welding uphill to ensure perfect fusion and prevent slag inclusions. What I mean to say is that the quicker pace is less forgiving to mistakes/daydreaming. Really keep an eye out for a lack of fusion if you're going downhill; this is the downside of the speed/low heat input. 6010/6011 penetrate a lot better and are less of a problem in this regard. Some codes up here are more forgiving than others for lack of fusion faults. Would you believe that water pipes are more critical than natural gas pipes? A non-compressable medium is harder on the pipes.... As for current: What feels right? For 1/8" 7018 with short, fat cables I prefer it at ~120A for most stuff. Welder in the basement with cables strung to the roof? Boss bought smaller(cheaper) cables than he should have? Maybe a fair bit more. Run it electrode positive. By the way: sometimes you run low hydrogen with straight polarity. For low hydrogen open root welds the root pass is usually done with straight polarity. I've done pipe with 9018 this way. It took a while to get the hang of it, haven't done it since, and may never do it again(especially if I have my way). Anyway... Why was your helper cussing, exactly? Some machines are better for starting welds than others; smaller machines can be trouble. If your machine runs well but takes a few seconds to get there, then use a run-on plate. Basically, you clamp a scrap next to where you need to start, strike the arc on the scrap and wait until the arc is stable before moving it over where you need it. Or you could rent a bigger machine for the job. If you're close to the rated output of a smaller unit, it would be prudent to check the duty cycle. Since it's stick, you'll be stopping to chip slag and change electrodes so it doesn't necessarily need to be 100%. Each machine and situation is different...if yours won't cut it then rent one that will. Structural, eh? A quick tip for when you're on the roof and the welder is in the basement: A good rule of thumb is that for a current setting that works for your 7018, the next larger size of 6010/11 will run nicely too. So, if you're running 1/8" 7018 put a few 5/32" 6010 in your bag and it might just save your tail in a pinch. Actually, if I'm in the situation of having my welder on a different level or outside, and I'm doing work with no weld specification given then I'll take a few sizes of 6010 with me rather than make a 5 minute trip every time I want to adjust my current. Want it hotter? Switch to a smaller rod. The ability of 6010 to penetrate so well and burn through its own (relatively light) slag under most situations means a rod of a given size can be usable over a wider current range than 7018...in my experience...it makes this trick easier than you might think. A funny snippet about welding in Canada: In Canada, our welding standards are set by the Canadian Standards Association(CSA) and the codes for our electrodes are basically the same as the AWS system except our tensile strength is given in Megapascals...but most of us use KPSI like Americans. SI hasn't taken over the trades up here yet! Anyway...the position code for 7018, according to the AWS is good for all positions including vertical-downhand but the CSA up here says it's good for all positions except vertical-downhand. Sometimes you get an electrode with a CSA and an AWS code printed on it that both have the same position code...but two meanings... Does that mean that I can't weld downhill in Canada? One last thought: When in doubt, farm it out. Holy smokes! What started as a few quick thoughts kinda' grew.

This just in! I've bought a pack of kreteks and can no longer be considered a non-smoker....the Djarums of today don't have the kick of the ones I smoked as a boy but they're better than the mainstream offerings.

I don't worry so much about rot as end-checking. I would paint the ends so they don't dry too quickly and split; you want sound wood to secure to. Finnr: I remember visiting the Centre for Maritime Archaelogy in the Netherlands (in Lelystad) where there was an elderly German fellow working. They were spraying wreck parts with polyethylene glycol. I was working through the language barrier...I was wondering what was being used to preserve the wooden parts....he produced a card with an ingredient list and pointed to the PEG....and said that that was what was used on the wooden parts...but the card was actually a list of ingredients of some cardiac medicine he was taking....he said that PEG was used to help "old wrecks"...we had a good laugh.

Congradulations! It's great when everybody gets what they want/need.