Intro to Aluminum Welding with AC TIG (2) 9m 59s - 19m 54s

I'm going to show
you guys the foot pedal

right now, I got to reach down here

and we're going to kick over
to a different camera

so we can see the foot pedal,
right here.

I'm going to move that,

boop, like that, okay.

So-- oh, yeah-- so most TIG welders,

uh, if you are looking
at a dedicated TIG machine

or TIG machine
that has high frequency start,

you do--
this is a great option to have,

not-- you don't have to have this
on your TIG machine,

but the foot pedal is great to have.

The foot pedal basically
controls the amperage of the torch.

Uh, think of it
like a gas pedal for the welder.

As you're welding, you push down
on the foot pedal,

it will
increase the amperage of the torch.

You can back off on the foot pedal

and it will decrease the amperage.

Well, the reason that's important

is because as you are welding,

if you notice that the puddle

is getting a little bit large,
you can back off

on that amperage input

to ensure that you're not putting
too much heat into the torch.

Not saying you have
to have a foot pedal,

but I'm saying it's certainly
worth investing in one,

and if your machine has one on it,
make sure you use it.

It's also something you need to get
used to just sort of having around,

it's a good way
to practice getting things set up.

So,

now we're going to talk
about two different types of start

on our TIG machine.

So, you basically
have a high frequency start,

which is what the AC/DC 205 has on it,

but you can turn it off.

But we'll talk about that later.

But you also have the scratch start

for some TIG machines,
or on a lot of the machines we have

what's called a lift TIG start.

So I'm going to try
to clean up my desk here

so I can possibly
show you a little bit more

about that, so here we go.

So, on a lift TIG type torch,

I'm going to wrestle
this one over into the shot here.

So, if-- on a lift TIG type torch,

usually it looks like this.

You basically have a knob

that turns on the gas flow
from the welder,

and some type of button

that energizes the arc.

On a lift TIG torch,

what you would do
is you would take your workpiece,

set it down,

you would touch the tungsten
to the workpiece.

You then push the button

and rock it off,
and the arc will start,

and then you begin your welding.

On a scratch start,
it's usually similar.

What you would do,
is you would energize it

and then just scratch it
across the material,

that would energize the arc,

and then you would begin welding.

On a high frequency start,
it's different than that.

High frequency allows you to

basically get the torch
into the correct position

that you want to weld.

You're going to keep about 1/8th

to a 3/16th gap
between the tip of the tungsten

and the material that you want to weld,

and then you will
energize the workpiece

by pressing down on your gas pedal,

in this case, your foot pedal,
and that is going to

start the arc,
and we're going to start welding.

So, I can actually demonstrate
that for you, right now.

So, I'm going to get on my--
some of my PPE here

for safety's sake,
and then we'll cut to the other camera,

and I will demonstrate
a high frequency start for you guys,

just on this little work piece
right here.

Put on my glasses.

Also, I should mention,
there-- there should be somebody

from ESAB Welding and Cutting
on our livestream.

If you have any questions
about any of the machines

or filler material
or anything like that,

go ahead and ask it
and they're going to chime in.

I will, at the end of the video,
kick over,

scroll through some of the questions,

and see what's going on,
and I will answer what I can.

So, I'm going to kick this over to DC.

Here we go, so now I have it set
for high frequency start.

DC TIG,
I have a piece of steel right here,

I'm going to merge this over,
there we go.

A piece of steel right here.

I have some filler metal,
right here, in one hand.

I have my torch in the other hand,

and what I'm going to do
is I'm going to hold this torch,

like I said, 3/16 of an inch away,

and then I'm going to mash the gas.

Oops, I might not
have my ground hooked up.

That's my fault, I don't think
I have the ground hooked up.

There we go, did that time,

so you can see it just jumped across

and then I can just begin...

Welding.

Okay, so,

that is just
basically a very simple

[singsongy] shoooooop.

I don't know if it'll focus.

Very simple bead on a piece of,

uh, a piece of plate that I had here,

just laying around the shop.

Come back over here.

And so that is
our high frequency start, demonstrated

on a piece of mild steel welding
here in the shop.

You can hear that unlike MIG welding,

where it's loud, snap,
crackly bacon sound, doesn't happen.

TIG welding is a very quiet,
controlled weld in that case.

So now we're going to talk--
so that's our difference

between a high frequency
and a scratch or a lift TIG start.

Now I want to talk a little bit
about the amperage

that you're going
to set the machine at.

So you basically are going
to start right away

by unpacking your TIG welder.

You've got your PPE out,

you have everything in place,
got your torch,

you've chosen your collet,
you've chosen your tungsten,

you've gotten it sharp.

I should have mentioned that,
I apologize,

your tungsten should be sharp
at all times in these machines,

any of the inverter type machines,

whether you're welding AC
or DC or tungsten,

is going to be sharpened.

I'm going to show you an example
of that sharpness

on this piece right here
in a second here.

Um, and then you need
to determine the amperage

that you're going to set the machine at.

Now, there are some resources out there

that you can get, so this is--

I got to make sure
I get the right side...

Make sure I get the right side
for you guys,

I'm going to cut to this.

We're going to go over to this one.

So this right here is a--
basically a welding calculator.

So, it's like a little slide rule

that you can just sort of
slide up and down,

and you can read, you know,
thickness of your tungsten,

size of the cup,
size of the filler material,

what you're going to be welding,
and it will give you

all of the information
that you need to set the amperage

on your welder.

There is a basic rule of thumb

that you can follow,
and that rule of thumb

is for every 1,000th of an inch
of material

that you're going to weld,

you need about one amp.

So, this material is 1/8th inch plate,

so I would set my machine

at about 125, 130 amps,

and I would weld it.

Anything-- and as I increase
the thickness of that plate,

obviously I would increase
the amperage on the machine.

Some people like to
just take the machine

and immediately max it out

and run the whole thing with their foot.

Um, that's one way to do it.

You can just take the machine,
roll it up to all the amperage,

and run it with your foot.

Um, that gets a little bit tricky

when-- if you have a 210 amp machine

and you're working with,
you know, 18 gauge, 20 gauge steel,

maybe some 1/8th inch plate,

you're really not taking advantage
of the foot pedal

because you're only
using the first half of it.

So that's a little bit trickier
to deal with,

but that is one option you can do.

I prefer sort of
the rule of thumb method myself.

Um, post flow.

Now the post flow on the machine

is a setting that you can set in the--

in the parameters guide
if it's one of these Rebels,

or most machines have it
as just a dial on the front.

"Post flow" is referring
to the amount of seconds

that, uh, argon continues to flow

out of the torch after you weld.

You want to set that for, um.

Well, it really depends;
if you're paying for your own argon,

maybe a second or two.

If the company's paying for argon,

guys will run that all day long.

Um, post flow, basically,
you want to have a, you know,

sometimes 0.7 seconds to a second
is, is, uh, acceptable.

You basically want to have argon
flowing until you visibly see

that TIG weld no longer
be cherry red in your helmet.

And most importantly,
you don't want to move the torch.

Probably the biggest mistake
I see people do

when they're welding is,

basically what they do is they

finish that bead, and then
as soon as they get to the end,

they're all excited,
they want to see it,

so they just pull the torch away
and want to look at it.

But the problem is when you do that,

you're basically
robbing the tail end of that bead

from your argon,

and you--
and you want to continue that flow.

It not only protects the tungsten
from contamination,

but it protects the weld.

So, you want to,
when you're done welding,

you want to basically
go down the bead, stop,

let it sit, let it rest,

and then pull it away,
uh, to see the weld.

I know it's exciting, especially
if it's your first couple times,

uh, using your TIG welder,

but it is something I see people do,

um, quite often with their welder.