gasless welding help?

[Daverse 175]

alright guys,

So today I invested in a mig welder, and got together some scrap metal to have a go with, one problem I found is that the welder was just spitting and spluttering everywher. seeing as I'm still new to welding, I assumed it was me that was doing it wrong. But I rang up a friend who does a bit of welding and he too has recently gone to a gasless mig welder and he has the same problem. any thoughts on anything we could be doing wrong? my welder is just a clarke 90 turbo, a cheap thing i got second hand.

Any help would be great, thanks

[bungy 2]

I've never been a fan of gas less welding as the gas is vital to a descent weld. Have you tried turning the power down until it is hard to get the arc and then increase the power in increments before it spits and splutters. It does sound like you have too much power or too slow on the wire feed.

[Daverse 175]

ok cheers Bungy, I'll have another crack tomorrow, to be honest trying to work out what the current setting is a bit of a faff, it goes in switches like 1 -2 then 3-4 and then theres a min - max switch, I'll start low tomorrow and have another practice, for now i'm too busy tending to my burns!

[legvw 0]

Too much wire speed, try with less mate

[Daverse 175]

cheers mate, it was set quite high, think about 3-4 for 3.5mm steel should do?

[russj249 2]

I use my mig welder as hot as it will go without blowing holes, that way you get a good penetration.. I have used both gas and gasless welders, and set up exactly the same on 2 machines, the gasless one was crap in comparison.. the gas is much much easier and neater, I was told it was something to do with their being a flux or something built into the gasless wire.

And for 3.5mm steel, I would have my gas mig set on full power (also a Clarke 90) model and with wire speed somewhere between 4 and 4.5.

If youre just starting out welding, there is one massive massive thing I would suggest anyone to do, and thats to get themselves an auto darkening welding mask.. those things are amazing and well worth the money!

[Daverse 175]

I use my mig welder as hot as it will go without blowing holes' date=' that way you get a good penetration.. I have used both gas and gasless welders, and set up exactly the same on 2 machines, the gasless one was crap in comparison.. the gas is much much easier and neater, I was told it was something to do with their being a flux or something built into the gasless wire.

And for 3.5mm steel, I would have my gas mig set on full power (also a Clarke 90) model and with wire speed somewhere between 4 and 4.5.

If youre just starting out welding, there is one massive massive thing I would suggest anyone to do, and thats to get themselves an auto darkening welding mask.. those things are amazing and well worth the money!

[/quote']

Thanks for the info mate, Yeah i think you use solid wire for gas, and flux core wire for gasless, or the other way round. I'll see where the nearest dealer of gas is too me, I will consider going gas if its not too steep

Yeah first thing I bought was a helmet, i have been receiving end of arc eye before, and I'm not doing it again!

[legvw 0]

Gas is used with some flux cored wires, but not what you'll be doing!

I had a mig-mate 130, the wire feed side of it was proper cheap and nasty so I modified it. That helped alot, but you do get what you pay for

[Daverse 175]

Yeah, I new it was going to be cheap before I bought it, but I'm not after anything fancy, just something easy to use to teach me how to weld.. sort of..