A son stops by (on topic!)

Son Kevin came by tonight. He wanted to try his hand at welding. I think his sister Karen shamed him into it. He's never had any interest but Karen has done a couple of welding projects with me in the past couple of years after the rather amazing and sudden sea change in her relationship with Mary. Those weren't projects where she watched me weld, she did the welding and some brazing.

Kev had a broken office chair he wanted to mend. The job was quite amenable to MIG welding, so a good "instant success" first job candidate because MIG is easy to learn. It's also easy to do badly but a mentor can help a lot there.

I cleaned the site(s) using a Scotchbrite Roloc disc in a pneumatic die grinder. Those things are magic.

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?¢-scotchbriteâ?¢-disc-coarse-p-64446.html?sourceid=googleps Then I had Kev try a few practice beads on scrap with the MIG. He said "you don't have a mask." I said I didn't need one, I'd know when it's running right by the sound. He was laying good, well-fused bead by the third try. The Miller MIG really is easy to use -- particularly if there's an experienced set of ears listening to the arc and hands on the wire speed dial. On to the cash job! I had him hold the parts in reasonably correct proximity while I zapped a tack weld. We then did a bit of adjusting with a deadblow plastic-face hammer to get it just so, and then he had at it, welding a bit of steel tube about 1" dia and 1/8" wall thickness into a boss in a stamping made from about 16 gage or maybe 14 gage. Based on sound and on appearance of the welds, I'd say he got 'er done just fine. The first bead was a bit more convex than I'd like but that's mostly vanity. It was obviously well-fused. A little extra metal there won't hurt a thing and it's under the seat so it won't show. I had him speed up a bit mid-course and I turned down the wire speed a skosh. His last weld ended up right next to my tack weld and they're about identical.

He and Karen can flip for the Miller when I shuffle off this mortal coil...

Reply to
Don Foreman
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Be glad you can still teach him something.

I let "The Kid" turn on my welder when he was twelve. He, of course, wouldn't listen to me at that age. By the next day he was teaching me how to weld.

"The Kid" is coming out tommorrow to sight in my new toy. I'm sure he'll teach me stuff here too.

One of his favorite sayings, "You're kind of stupid, aren't you fat old bald guy?" He used to be serious, now its a joke between us when I say something about you can't teach these damned kids anything.

Karl

Reply to
Karl Townsend

My 8 year old already can stick weld with 6013.

i
Reply to
Ignoramus543

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