Harold in CR
100 kW
Please excuse my ignorance. I never went to college or trade schools. I am NOT trying to start an argument, or disagree with any pro or certified aluminum welder person.
My story: after being involved with Treasure Hunting, in salt water conditions, I put together my own boat. We use "Propwash" blowers, that corral the thrust of water produced by a boat engine to drive the boat. IF a boat can do 40 MPH, then, you have that much thrust to deflect down to blow away the sand on the ocean floor.
Yeah, this IS getting to a point. We used a giant PVC elbow, installed in an aluminum frame using 6061-T6 channel and angle.
All we had was a 120V 140 Miller MIG welder, and used plain aluminum welding wire, on the spool. NO flux on the wire. We DID use Argon, and, we scuffed up the aluminum to "clean it".
Now, we also did many repairs to aluminum blowers and winch supports on up to 60' boats. That's a LOT of power.
We also built approx 20 of these blowers from scratch, and, never had 1 fail. THEY were built using a TIG welder.
My questions are, Were we extremely lucky to make all this work without failure ? How is it possible to weld without that TIG welder, and do a pretty decent job laying beads and not having failure ?
I am after info re: Tig versus Mig on aluminum. I don't expect to do mods on bicycle frames, BUT, I have a plan on building an Aluminum frame WITH Aluminum headpost, and would greatly appreciate straight talk. Theory is great, but, I learned to weld without theory classes.
PLEASE don't get uppity or feel like I'm talking down to anyone that responds. Just try to help me-US understand what I did wrong and still have very good results.
My story: after being involved with Treasure Hunting, in salt water conditions, I put together my own boat. We use "Propwash" blowers, that corral the thrust of water produced by a boat engine to drive the boat. IF a boat can do 40 MPH, then, you have that much thrust to deflect down to blow away the sand on the ocean floor.
Yeah, this IS getting to a point. We used a giant PVC elbow, installed in an aluminum frame using 6061-T6 channel and angle.
All we had was a 120V 140 Miller MIG welder, and used plain aluminum welding wire, on the spool. NO flux on the wire. We DID use Argon, and, we scuffed up the aluminum to "clean it".
Now, we also did many repairs to aluminum blowers and winch supports on up to 60' boats. That's a LOT of power.
We also built approx 20 of these blowers from scratch, and, never had 1 fail. THEY were built using a TIG welder.
My questions are, Were we extremely lucky to make all this work without failure ? How is it possible to weld without that TIG welder, and do a pretty decent job laying beads and not having failure ?
I am after info re: Tig versus Mig on aluminum. I don't expect to do mods on bicycle frames, BUT, I have a plan on building an Aluminum frame WITH Aluminum headpost, and would greatly appreciate straight talk. Theory is great, but, I learned to weld without theory classes.
PLEASE don't get uppity or feel like I'm talking down to anyone that responds. Just try to help me-US understand what I did wrong and still have very good results.