horseshoe182

engineering suppliers will (should) stock every drill size, hardware stores just stock standard drill sizes and usually inferior quality too. and welding supply shops will stock a vast array mig tip types and sizes. cheers Michael

i would most probably use 316 stainless rods to weld it. but try and get some heat into it, even if just a little bit. i,ve used stainless rods many times on cast parts with success. i did weld cast leg back onto a old guillotine with full weld prep. it never broke off again. the legs could be designed in such a way that the leg load is spread out , in an effort to reduce stress on each leg.

hi mr Wooldridge. Tiging stainless can be a trickery thing. I,ve done a bit(lot) . Like bryce said the grease, after dressing the damaged area i would thorougly clean with a metho solution. and then over lap the corners and place very small fusion tacks every 20 to 25mm. if you don,t it will buckle while you weld it. you can purge or use a backing palte/block, i would purge. and run the amps at about what you have ,50. Is 20 gauge 2-3mm? 45 to 50 sounds ok. start in the corners and weld out with one pass only , but it should penerterate if your purging(no holes). the weld shouldn,t be black and this indicates that the weld iis to hot. The thing with stainless is that if it,s welded to hot, the heat will burn out important elements in the steel, and the may cause premerture wear/corriode, however as it,s a grease vat it won,t corriode but the cylconic heating and cooling may cause it to stress crack again. hope this helps

And i forgot, you can take it to a machine shop and get it machined out on a mill. Mick

Can you take it to a machine shop and get them to punch it out on a hole puncher? Because it is 1/8 drill in 3/8 it might be a stretch. I work with 316 stainless and it is soft in comprassion to carbon steel. However I,m not formillaler with 416 stainless, do you mean 316 stainless? If you drill from the other side why can,t you punch out the drill with a small centre punch? Or best of all, take it to a lazer cutter shop and get them it cut it out, it will be done perfect but you will have to pay. My last answer is let it rust away in there and then drill it out, a drop of acid will speed up the process, it is stainless so it will be ok. I wouldn,t put any heat near it. In a fabrication workshop, If you break a tapp or drill, no one wants to know you, it is a real hard one to fix. But it can be fixed. Just be pataiant with it, cause its not an "easy fix". You just have to find an engennging solution to it. An would be a shame to damage a project for lack of a solution. Mick

Hello night_wish2 I reckon you are using 1/8 rod too, is that right? I don't know if i'd be using that size on 1/2" plate for vertical up. How long is the weld? If you weld the hole rod, by the time you get half way through the rod, the plate and weld may get to hot and become difficult to control the weld, as you said "lots of globular piles" I have no problems about the rod type, just it,s the size, application and your amps are to high. Your pause is to long. The way you,re set up, you will need to move much quicker. So, to big a rod + to high amps + weld to slow = poor weld and problerly undercut. I would try 6013 2.4mm rod I use them on any polarity , do some test runs first, I would try the amps at 75 to start with. Where are the pic,s? Cheers

Hi naked, How did you go with the 2 inch stuff, long pipe hangin off it (leverage). In order to concentrate the heat did you use a heating torch and oxy/act set? What is an induction coil?

I,m very shore that you have a cross contamination problem. And what that means is ;- When mild steel scarches, rubs against stainless it will comaminate it. Also using a steel wire brush or one that has been used on steel, using a grinding wheels, cutting wheels, linisher, polisher/buff that perviously been used on mild steel will contaminate the stainless, using (mild steel) contaminated abrasives impregnates the stainless with mild steel particles. And then starts the rusting. How does that happen? most poeple say, "its stainless it can,t rust" sombody has used a contaminated abrasive on it, or it,s just come in contact with steel. In a industry fabrication workshop, it is always to best to speperate the mild steel workshop and the stainless workshop or take special percautions. That is because of cross contamintion. What the industry practise is to have dedicated abrasives and sometimes dedicated work areas. If your working on a big dollar stainless job, you don,t just pick up a grinder and use it on the stainless, you must know that the grinding wheel is a dedicated stainless wheel or containation may happen. I don,t like your chances of reversing your problem, Maybe passivate and clean with a new scotchbrite pad, or a few new flap disks or a few new linishing belts. Don,t use a wire brush on it unless it is a "stainless wire brush". And then add a nice lite oil, there have been many good sugestions, I like WD40. Good luck with it.

And check your primary curcit (power cable) maybe the plug and or leed is damaged. Also, is the power supply working ok?