No, no pics yet but I finally started playing around with the new 110vac Hobart MIG welder I got for my birthday Saturday.
First thing I learned is that I need a leather welding jacket, the leather apron and gloves aren't protecting my arms from all my splatter heheh!
Next I learned how smart of a purchase I made in buying the better quality Hobart-Miller auto darkening helmet from eBay rather than using the cheapy auto darkening helmet that came with the welder. Worked fine, no eye problems, pretty awesome! Then to see what the cheapy helmet was like, I tried it. OW! I found that I was squinting through the thing due to how bright the weld point was. Wow I had a big blue pattern in my eyes for about ten minutes afterwards. No adjustments to make it darker, no nothing. That thing is going into the trash unless someone can tell me how to swap its lens for a darker version. I'll buy another Hobart or Miller helmet for my son since he appears to want to learn too.
Some good welds towards the end but throughout this afternoon, I had some trouble with spattering. I think I might be getting it under control a little more by running a little shorter wire length out of the gun. I was using 1/2" but that is from the outer barrel, not the inner tip so it seems better with a bit shorter tip.
Using an argon/carbon dioxide shielding gas at 20 cfm, solid ER70S-6 .030 and scrap stock up to 3/16". Welding at 55"/minute, all the way at the max 5 welding voltage.
I didn't seem to be getting good penetration on the 3/16" scrap steel at first but it may now be getting better. It appears I'm getting much better penetration since going to a shorter stub... makes sense now that I read up on it a little more. Could that be helping reduce splatter too? I'm stopping to cut off the tip to get a fresh point and make sure the tip isn't too long which seems to cut down on splatter but...
So so far, all good but just need more practice. Need to figure out what's causing the splatter. The polarity is correct, the negative post is connected to the ground wire I clip to the work... as my book says I need for solid wire.
Hey, I welded my wife's broken real estate sign stand pretty good for her. It looked pretty good after a bit of grinding and gloss black paint heheh. She's now happy she bought me the welder since I welded her $5 sign stand.
Ok, an another hour or two tonight and I'll take pics Saturday for some critiques.
(by the way, my eyes still seem a bit tired/sore/watery from having used that cheap helmet for just a few beads!)