welding steel

What welder do you have? What output? If you are absolute newby harbor freight sells a learn to weld book that will give basics

>>1065355
1/16 electrode 308 alloy run at about 80 amps down hand. Thin stuff like that it's perfectly fine to go down on. Keep your trav l rate quick and just try to fuse it together with very little filler

>>1065364
I have access to a bunch of Lincoln Electric, and even one of those 'reality welders' so mig, tig, gmaw, arc, oxy/a...standard stuff

found some sticks labeled 'stainless steel' in an old cabinet and that how this all got started.

>>1065371
I'll look up 'downhand'
copy that with the 'quick' bit.

>>1065414
Go with tig for something this thin. As the other anon suggested, a fast travel speed is crucial so practice your dip and pull technique until you can really roll. Weld just a few inches at a time switching places on the piece to give the areas that you welded time to cool.

>>1065477
you know how tig welding produces that rainbow which can be brushed off?

arc welding has the same thing, but its underneath a layer of slag.

>any tips for removing said slag?
>is the rainbow coloring a 'loose' layer of slag?

>>1065586
Normal mig welders don't produce slag unless you're using flux core.

The discoloring is from heat distortion in the metal, you're not getting rid of it.

>>1065928
Actually, normal MIG does produce slag, just very minuscule amounts and it typically comes off from the cooling of the metal on its own.

>>1065931
Not if you properly prep the metal and have enough shielding gas

>>1065936
Even then there is usually a tiny amount of slag. Note the use of the word "tiny".

you guys are just too fun. thx every1!

>>1065928

That discoloring does come off if you scrub it real good with a wire brush or even better hit it with a wire wheel on an angle grinder.

>>1065928
>>1066033
a perfect stainless steel weld will be a bright silver color, no blues or golds.

the rainbow sheen i get under my slag must be a layer of carbon drawn from the steel by heat. does this layer effect your next weld should the two be overlapping?

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>>1066121
>a perfect stainless steel weld will be a bright silver color, no blues or golds.
The rainbow color is a by product of heat on steel and can even be seen on mild steel. The more pronounced gold and blues on stainless is oxygen reacting with chromium rather than just heat. It indicates heat but heat is required to weld so what's more important is how wide the rainbow, or heat affected zone is. When you've fucked up stainless it turns a dull grey, forms little dark spots that look like brown sugar or flat out rusts soon after welding it. I was taught that shades of gold are perfect, blue is still good, purple is pushing it and anything else it's fucked. Could all be bro science, I'm not a metallurgical engineer just a welder.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2ePmA3VKbc&list=PL52lqKDQaoDhCanVJHqbiSy5FrGjBnsci&index=4
>>1065931
>Actually, normal MIG does produce slag
There are very slight traces of silicon as well as copper coating for most mig wire which makes those tiny little mini "slag" spots, but in my experience they pop off when the weld cools or a brush stroke or two will remove them. If you tig weld with E70S-6 on dirty material you can see similar formations. It's a push to call that slag.

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>>1065586
>>1065931
>>1066121

It's mill scale you're talking about. No Slag from welding with gas. You may be talking about the "specks" and "flakes." That's the mill scale separating from the metal because the bond is from the process of making the metal in the first place. The heat is what causes the appearance

>>1066146
>>1066599
Every welding instructor I've ever had calls this slag.

>>1065414
Sticks? Flux covered sticks? Arc welding sticks go bad when they get old. They are usually kept in a climate/humidity controlled environment for long term storage.

>>1065355
another noob here.

I'm using a mig welder to weld two pieces of sheet steel at 1.5mm thick together but i seem to be having problems with excessive spatter and penetration.

Using shielding gas C02/ARGON mix 90/10 with a reduced wire speed of 4 as my Amperage doesnt seem to be melting the wire fast enough for it to pool.

I've tried raising the amps which seemed to solve the weld penetration problem but im getting mad spattering and its pissing me off as i managed to get a load down the back of my overalls

>>1067738
Did you have any pictures? What kind of weld are you doing exactly? Butt joint? Lap joint? Also, maybe get the miller weld settings app on you're phone. It usually gives you a pretty good general idea of the range you should be in before you start messing with settings to fit how you weld. PS on MIG your amperage is set by your wire speed.

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>>1067761
I'm using a Clarke 135TE Turbo, it's got a 1/2 & Min/Max switch on the front and a wire speed dial, the manual provided no information on what Min/Max was or 1/2 so i assumed it was to do with Amperage, it came with a reference guide on settings but it stated it was a rough guide and to tweak it to what you need.

My welds have an excessive spatter with a dark burn around them (which might be poor gas flow even though the bottle is on max output) and the beads are pretty sparse and disjointed.

i tried playing around with it and just seeing if i was moving the torch head too fast so i kept it in one place and I seemed to build up quite a nice pool, so it may just be me moving my torch too fast.

I do more brazing with copper than anything else so maybe me assuming those techniques would carry across is a bad assumption.

this isnt my weld but its very similar in appearance

>>1067765
>My welds have an excessive spatter

Too much current.

>>1067772
so turn down my wire feed then?

>>1067773
Just read through the manual again, turns out 1/2 are current options and Min/max are also current options, doesn't say what Amp scale it conforms to but i guess ill have to use the chart to get a ball park figure, ill try post some of my welds next week