Spool Gun Welds

[djd775]

I've done a lot of looking around and seen very little discussion on regular run-of-the-mill aluminum mig welding. I'd love to hear from some of you who have done a lot of alum mig and developed ways of coping with the typical issues such as cold starts, not having enough room to backstep on short beads, overheating on longer welds, spatter, etc. I have a TA 252i with the 200A Tweco spool gun, so not hot-start, pulse, etc.

Anyone willing to share pictures and settings of some good aluminum mig beads?


To be fair, here are a couple pictures of where I'm at:

6061 T6511 in 3/16 thickness
0.035 4043 wire
22V, 280ipm



horizontal fillet


flat


vertical up


both side flanges were welded vertical down, then a horizontal bead to try to try to fill the end craters from the down-hills


I guess I could've cleaned the soot off before taking the pictures...sorry.

[CEP]

There is a member here, I can’t think of the kid's name right now. He runs a spool gun all day building trailers. The kid is amazing. Hopefully he’ll see your thread and post some of his pictures!

[soutthpaw]

There is a member here, I can’t think of the kid's name right now. He runs a spool gun all day building trailers. The kid is amazing. Hopefully he’ll see your thread and post some of his pictures!

There is another member that builds a lot of walkways, gangplanks, docks etc in aluminum, Do you remember who that is?

[CEP]

Do you remember who that is?

No that doesn’t ring any bells at all.

[djd775]

There is a member here, I can’t think of the kid's name right now. He runs a spool gun all day building trailers. The kid is amazing. Hopefully he’ll see your thread and post some of his pictures!

Yeah, that's exactly the kind of people that I'd be interested in hearing from.

I don't know if I can edit my original post or not, but I had the wrong settings in my mind...original pictures were actually welded at 24v and 350ipm.

[7A749]

No that doesn’t ring any bells at all.

Welderj is about the only guy I can think of off the top of my head that does aluminum trailers..

Dunno.

[Doug247]

Yofish? There is a different person cep is talking about does Sylvester sound familiar?

[abec]

heres some of the alu mig work ive done all with 047 5356 wire on a miller 354mpa with a xra feeder with 30ft whip all straight cv no pulse or hot start

[CEP]

Welderj is about the only guy I can think of off the top of my head that does aluminum trailers..

Dunno.

No not Jon.
If I’m not mistaken this kid has a picture in his avatar of a young guy wearing black horn rimmed glasses. With short hair. Don’t know if that’s him or not.
The kid makes some beautiful aluminum Mig welds.

[ishuum]

I think it his name was Puty?

No not Jon.
If I’m not mistaken this kid has a picture in his avatar of a young guy wearing black horn rimmed glasses. With short hair. Don’t know if that’s him or not.
The kid makes some beautiful aluminum Mig welds.

[CEP]

I think it his name was Puty?

You know, I think you’re right!

[djd775]

Thanks for all your replies so far! abec, those look like some pretty cool projects! What kind of material thickness do you typically work with?

Here are a couple more, pretty much all welded at:
20.5V 248ipm
1/8" 5052 sheet, inside corner weld...finding it almost impossible to not blow through
28 cfh 100% argon
0.035" 4043 wire

The verticals were welded downhill as fast as I could keep the arc lit, so I wouldn't burn through
The horizontals I was welding about 2" long sections and back-stepping to try to control the heat there.

1/8" material with a spool gun seems to be about the limit that I've found...gotta be pretty careful that it doesn't end up in a big puddle on the floor

[abec]

I work with anything from 1/8th 5052 and up to 2inch thick 6061 alu.

[Bob]

Check out posts by ZTFab.

[Welder Dave]

You should be cleaning your aluminum better before welding it. It looks a little cold or could use more volts to widen and flatten the weld.

[djd775]

You know, I think you’re right!

Thanks...I found a couple posts of his welds now....definitely some sweet looking beads. That led me to a bunch of threads that I had been unable to locate previously. One thing - I think I need to try turning up my gas flow...was running around 30cfh, but suggestions seem to be more in the 40-50 range.

I work with anything from 1/8th 5052 and up to 2inch thick 6061 alu.

Where would you start for settings on 1/8" 5052? The thin stuff seems to cause me the most headaches - seems like once I get settings close enough to hold a clean and stable spray arc, it's just dying to pull through on the back side.


This is a lap in 1/8" 5052 that I ran at 20.5V, 248ipm 0.035" 4043 wire. Like I said, having a tough time getting the sweet spot for a stable arc and consistent puddle while being concerned about overheating.

Check out posts by ZTFab.

I'll do that when I get a little more time...I knew there had to be threads out there, just a matter of knowing what to look for...thanks for the suggestion!

You should be cleaning your aluminum better before welding it. It looks a little cold or could use more volts to widen and flatten the weld.

Ok, I can try bumping up the volts a hair, but last time I tried that, I just ended up burning through. The picture may be deceiving - my concern was that I wasn't getting enough fillet thickness - these beads are actually quite concave when you look at them. I really can't afford any more heat input, you can see it pulling on the backside here:

[djd775]

To clarify...the beads that I'm referring to as being pretty concave, are the ones in Post #12

[MinnesotaDave]

Are you running a spool gun without a WFS adjustment knob?
When I did that I hated it.

I bought a used push-pull Cobramatic and the WFS adjustment lays right under my thumb - allows me to dial my spray arc length as I weld - much much better.

Keep at it

(Still prefer tig though)

[abec]

Hmm one thing is your whipping your weld on 1/8th try doing a straight push. I run 50cfh of argon with a 5/8 nozzle works great I have to step up to a 3/4 in nozzle to pass vertical weld tests.

1/8th alu flat fillet or but I run 22.5v at 450-500ipm vertical I go to 21.5v and drop down to 350-400 in a open corner I do 22.5v and keep the wire speed low say 400 to keep the arc back in the puddle to help prevent burn through

[Jieve]

If you google the Glen-L boat building forum and "aluminum MIG", there is a long post about aluminum MIG techniques written by Kevin Morin (I think, also a member here). There is some really really great info in that thread about joint prep and setup, dealing with cold starts and restarts, definitely worth checking out. I saved it as a pdf.

[djd775]

Are you running a spool gun without a WFS adjustment knob?
When I did that I hated it.

I bought a used push-pull Cobramatic and the WFS adjustment lays right under my thumb - allows me to dial my spray arc length as I weld - much much better.

Keep at it

(Still prefer tig though)

My spool gun does have a WFS adjustment under the base of the handle, but it is easily bumped out of position, so I put a piece of tape over it until I can find a better way to deal with the issue. Just trying to eliminate variables until I can get dialed in. Know what you mean about TIG...I 'm tigging anything that's critical, just trying to get better with spool-gun for better productivity.

Hmm one thing is your whipping your weld on 1/8th try doing a straight push. I run 50cfh of argon with a 5/8 nozzle works great I have to step up to a 3/4 in nozzle to pass vertical weld tests.

1/8th alu flat fillet or but I run 22.5v at 450-500ipm vertical I go to 21.5v and drop down to 350-400 in a open corner I do 22.5v and keep the wire speed low say 400 to keep the arc back in the puddle to help prevent burn through

Thanks, I'll give those settings a try...I know my WFS sounds low, I'll have to check if the calibration is right. Will be a couple days before I have time to get at anything though.

If you google the Glen-L boat building forum and "aluminum MIG", there is a long post about aluminum MIG techniques written by Kevin Morin (I think, also a member here). There is some really really great info in that thread about joint prep and setup, dealing with cold starts and restarts, definitely worth checking out. I saved it as a pdf.

Thank you for this! Kevin clearly put a lot of work into the thread, cheers for that. I'll be looking through that more closely as I have time.

I think part of my issues stem from being out of position and not having the experience and muscle memory to make the beads in awkward positions. I was in the shop last night and found a couple of the test strips that I used to get my starting settings and they look much better than the pictures I posted of welds on an actual workpiece.

[HT2-4956]

So who's going to be the first to try using a spool gun to weld two of these newer, heavier, bottle style aluminum beer cans together base to base?

[abec]

just remember I use a diff wire then what your using I believe your using .035 4043 and I'm using 047 5356