WANTED, Welding Guru

[Hankl]

Aluminum...let me suggest you get your tungsten ready to go first:

Switch your rig to DC positive, keep the amps down, and the tip will form a ball. It may take a couple tries to get it neat. Flip back to AC and weld away.

He has a Dynasty 200, Inverter, doesn't need to ball up the tip.

Hank

[Bert]

He has a Dynasty 200, Inverter, doesn't need to ball up the tip.
Hank

Really? I haven't used my Dynasty 200 yet, Tig was all on schools Synchrowave 350. We set it to ac, put the torch about 1/4" away from a piece of scrap aluminum and pressed down on the pedal to get the ball first. If you don't and keep the tip sharp, when you start tigging aluminum, it's going to ball up anyway. With the 200 inverter, you're telling me the tip will stay sharp while you tig?

[grumpy42]

Aluminum...let me suggest you get your tungsten ready to go first:

Switch your rig to DC positive, keep the amps down, and the tip will form a ball. It may take a couple tries to get it neat. Flip back to AC and weld away.

DO NOT BALL THE TUNGSTEN! I don't mean to shout, but even though I am just a beginner myself, I have done considerable research and reading and balled tungsten in not appropriate for inverter machines (e.g. Dynasty 200). In fact, as I understand it, it is actually possible to damage an inverter based machine by trying to ball the tungsten. I do not even think you will be able to start an arc with balled tungsten as it disperses the energy over a greater surface area.

Prepare the tungsten as it suggests in the manual - Grind to a point and grind a small flat spot at the tip. The manual does show a picture of balled tungsten (but not how to prepare balled tungsten), however, I believe that the picture is there either erroneously or for comparison. DON'T BALL THE TUNGSTEN!

With the 200 inverter, you're telling me the tip will stay sharp while you tig?

Depending on the balance and the type of tungsten, it will ball up over time. I was using 2% ceriated and found that it would ball up quite quickly. Eventially, it would ball up to a point that I could no longer start an arc and I would have to regrind it. Even when it got to that point, the tip looked like a dull pencil (not completely round like tungsten that is used for transformer based machines). Lanthinated tungsten holds its tip much better than the ceriated tungsten

[AC MOTORSPORTS]

I Have A Synchrowave 250 With A Water Cooler With A 300 Linde Torch On It "that Is My Home Welder"

I Work At A Ornemental Iron Shop Out In The Feld

In That Shop We Use Miller Synchowave 350

Out In The Feld We Have A Lincoln I75; 110 Volt And 240 Volt I Used It To Weld Aluminum And It Was Alot Harder To Weld With But I Got Better At It

The Inverter Is A Lot Harder At Start Up But When You Get The Start Up Set That Is The Hard Thing Welding Is Just Welding

Try Stanless And Weld On That That Will Get You Good Heat Control And Use The Hf On All The Time Get Use To That And Then When You Go To Ac The Hf Will Be Easier For You

When You Weld On Aluminum You Need To Clean It Realy Good And A Good Fit Up Is Very Important

I Have Tryed Tungsten Out In The Feld And At Work And Home There Is A Big Differents On All Of Them Do To The Power Sorce And For Aluminum On A Inverter The Green Tungsten Works Good

The One Thing I Have Done And It Was Hard To Think It Worked And That Is To Weld Aluminum Dc Positive We Did That On 3/16 About 6 Inch Long About 1/4 Fillet

There Is A Lot Of Guys On Here That Can Tell You What To Do And We Have The Storys But You Got To Do The Welding

Good Luck You Can Do It I Did It With A Linclon Welder

[MAC702]

Aluminum...let me suggest you get your tungsten ready to go first:

Switch your rig to DC positive, keep the amps down, and the tip will form a ball. It may take a couple tries to get it neat. Flip back to AC and weld away.

Did you notice what machine he has? Your advice is not recommended for his equipment.

[grumpy42]

I Have Tryed Tungsten Out In The Feld And At Work And Home There Is A Big Differents On All Of Them Do To The Power Sorce And For Aluminum On A Inverter The Green Tungsten Works Good

Green tungsten (pure tungsten) is not recommended for the Dynasty (or for inverters in general). I know that some people say that it is okay, but all of the literature specifically says not to use pure tungsten.

I started out using 2% ceriated (orange band) which worked great for mild steel, but would ball up quickly when doing aluminum. Lanthinated tungsten seems to keep its point better when working with AC (1.5% lanth. - yellow band, 2% lanth. - blue band).

[SundownIII]

Reference Help for Everyone,

I read all the "recommendations" about tungsten selection/preparation and just sit back and shake my head. There's as much "bad advice" put out as there is "good advice". How's a newbie to tell the difference?

I would suggest that anyone trying to learn to tig weld go to Diamond Ground Products website (www.diamondground.com) and download their "The Proper Selection & Preparation of Tungsten Electrodes for Arc Welding". Their guide is much more informative than much of the "internet hearsay".

Additionally, I would recommend that anyone new to tig welding, acquire a copy (download or purchase) of Miller's Tig Handbook for GTAW. It's a very good guide, much more accurate than some of the "expert posters".

Just my .02

[grumpy42]

Here are direct links for the documents that Sundown mentioned

Miller GTAW Handbook (one PDF instead of multiple PDFs from the miller site)
http://mookins.com/TIG%20Handbook.pdf

The Proper Selection & Preparation of Tungsten Electrodes for Arc Welding
http://www.diamondground.com/Guidebook0105.pdf

I think that it would be prudent for the administrator of these Miller forums to have a "sticky" post with a title something like "Important Dynasty/Inverter tig information". This post would contain basic information about the proper tungsten type and preparation for use with the Dynasty. It seems that everytime a new user posts a question about the Dynasty invariabley someone post a reply about balling the tungsten or using pure tungsten.

Just a though from a guy who probably shouldn't be giving advice...

[SundownIII]

Grumpy,

Thanks for making things easier.

Like you, I get very frustrated reading all the "bad advice" given on the board.

Going back to one of my favorite expressions, "Better to remain silent and be thought the fool than open one's mouth and remove all doubt".

This board can be a source of great information and I have learned a lot here. I have also seen a lot of bad information spouted as gospel.

[AC MOTORSPORTS]

Green tungsten (pure tungsten) is not recommended for the Dynasty (or for inverters in general). I know that some people say that it is okay, but all of the literature specifically says not to use pure tungsten.

I started out using 2% ceriated (orange band) which worked great for mild steel, but would ball up quickly when doing aluminum. Lanthinated tungsten seems to keep its point better when working with AC (1.5% lanth. - yellow band, 2% lanth. - blue band).

I HAVE NOT USED ORANGE OR YELLOW BUT WE HAD SOME BLUE IN OUR SHOP BUT WE WERE WELDING ON STANLESS THANKS FOR THE HELP

I WILL BE GOING TO ORDER THE RAINBOW OF TUNGSTEN SO I CAN SEE FIRST HAND IF THERE IS A BETTER TUNGSTEN THAN WHAT WE USE NOW

AND THAT IS TRUE WHAT DO YOU DO ASK FOR HELP OR READ ALL THAT LITERATURE AND FORGET WHAT YOU READ

THIS IS COOL I LEARNED SOMTHING FROM HERE " WELD ON "