Just a little rant on my welding job...

Jerry Bransford

Jerry Bransford

Too many arguments and personal attacks, I'm done.
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Fleming Island FL
My muffler has been making a racket so I finally found where its weld had come loose from where it holds the rear pipe into the muffler. Ok, drag out the welder, clean things up with a wire brush first.

First of all, my helmet wouldn't stay on my head. Laying on my back under the Jeep, every time I would lay my head back, that would push the headband adjustment knob in and release the head band so the helmet would fall off my head. Multiple times.

So then the wire would stop feeding for some reason, it never had that problem before. Tighten up the wire feed friction roller a tad and it was still not feeding 100% of the time. And this is with a Miller MIG welder, it's a good quality welder. Ok, keep at it anyway.

Then I'm welding and it looks like I'm blowing boogers onto the joint instead of welding. Sputtering, splattering, WTF. Thinking it's not getting enough shielding gas, I move the nozzle out a tad to trap more gas around the joint. Keep at it, figure I didn't get the joint cleaned well enough so I went at it again with the wire brush. No help, still looks like I'm piling boogers up over the joint. But they're holding so I say WTF and just keep at it just so it's better than it was. Well it's holding, kinda sorta at least, but heaven help me if @mrblaine sees it as is lol.

So I crawl out from underneath and start winding up the wires, gathering the tools, and rolling the welder back into the garage. I spot the gas valve on the back of the welding cart and instantly figured it out... sure enough, I forgot to turn the frigging gas valve on. F***. I'll redo the welds when I get back under to replace the track bar bracket. I apparently need a welding check list dammit.

1) Turn the effing gas on.
2) Turn on welder.
3) Weld. :D
 
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I've been working in a machine shop since I was 13 years old, I'm 34 now. I will say, welding is an art form. It's a skill that I wish I could master.
 
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Problem I have is trying to see the work area with my glasses on under the shield. Still have not found a cheater lense for the shield that I can see with.
 
TJ4Jim said:
Problem I have is trying to see the work area with my glasses on under the shield. Still have not found a cheater lense for the shield that I can see with.
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I wear standard reading glasses (150's) under the hood, they work ok. I keep looking at 150 lenses for the hood but if they don't work for you I'll just continue wearing reading glasses. Good to know they're not that good.
 
Jerry Bransford said:
I wear standard reading glasses (150's) under the hood, they work ok. I keep looking at 150 lenses for the hood but if they don't work for you I'll just continue wearing reading glasses. Good to know they're not that good.
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Had a lot of distortion with the cheaters and they gave me a headache.

Might want to give your welding lead a shot of WD 40 thru the feeder tube, I have the same problem when the welder sits for a long time between uses.
 
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Lol, knew exactly what was wrong as soon as you started describing it. Wanna know how, did the exact same thing not very long ago. Made me feel like a moron, I feel better now. thanks for sharing
 
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TJ4Jim said:
Had a lot of distortion with the cheaters and they gave me a headache.

Might want to give your welding lead a shot of WD 40 thru the feeder tube, I have the same problem when the welder sits for a long time between uses.
Click to expand...

+1 on some lube, and I pull the shield off the tip periodically and scrape out any weld splatter that's accumulated around the opening.
 
Wish I could weld period. And one of you has spent considerable time, like 21 years trying to perfect it. What I would do if I could weld would be insane!

Go get em @Jerry Bransford, you're all heart for the Jeep world! Love it...
 
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Been welding since I was 15. While I have never had a weld fail, I don't think I have made any welds that I would post on say, the welding web. If you want to feel humble check out some of the welds there.
And for the record I have done the exact same thing with the shielding gas. I understand completely your frustration.

B
 
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Jerry Bransford said:
I wear standard reading glasses (150's) under the hood, they work ok. I keep looking at 150 lenses for the hood but if they don't work for you I'll just continue wearing reading glasses. Good to know they're not that good.
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+1 on the reading glasses. I thought I was getting worse at welding and this cured it. My problem now is that I keep tripping over the wires because every thing that's 3' in front of me is a blur! :eusa_doh:
 
PCO6 said:
+1 on the reading glasses. I thought I was getting worse at welding and this cured it. My problem now is that I keep tripping over the wires because every thing that's 3' in front of me is a blur! :eusa_doh:
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Ha ain't that the truth. :D
 
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Neal said:
I had a really good comment to post, but I forgot it. Oh, and I found my reading glasses - on top of my head. Now if I can just remember where I put my hearing aids...
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Just don't jump into the water with hearing aids on as I did last year lol. The good and surprising thing I learned that day is that they were designed to be waterproof down to 3' or so.
 
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Ouch! OK, Jerry, you win! Sometimes I wonder why I even bother with hearing aids, even with them in my tinnitus is so bad I can't hear much anyway. A legacy of 15,000+ hours of helicopter flying over the last 40 years. It's why I have never bothered to upgrade my OEM radio - waste of money, that.
 
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