Learning to MIG weld....

Look around. Look at your local cheapie newspaper for ads from guys who do welding work. Talk to them. Usually, for a price, they will give you some lessons. A guy can show you the important stuff faster than you can absorb all the lessons, nomenclature, and written stuff of a course. The learning curve on MIG is quite short with anyone that has an IQ higher than room temperature. It's just getting to spend some time on a machine. MIG is the only machine I would suggest to a person who does not know how to weld. I believe I could teach a monkey to MIG weld.

Steve

Grab a machine, and a bunch of steel, and go to. Test every coupon to destruction - the trickiest part to learning to MIG properly is understanding that it is quite possible to lay a beautiful-looking bead which is not actually sticking to the parts being welded, and learning to avoid that. Bend them, cut them, look at what happened and where it broke.

Oh, and, ignore most of what you see on television - get a good helmet and at least a good jacket or cape-sleeve and bib plus gloves. "Sunburn" hurts, skin cancer sucks, no point in helping either by acting stupid.

I agree, get a welder... go to it. You will pick it up....

xman

"Ecnerwal" wrote .

Unless, of course, you're one of those big boobed blondes that like to weld with big hair and a fuzzy polyester sweater. Oh, wait. They do OA cutting with a welding hood.

Well, it don't matter. You aren't a big boobed big haired blonde, are you?

Steve

Just how big deal is UV exposure for a occasional welder like me.

My welding (arc) time is probably 2-3 minutes per week at best.

Should I even bother with wearing UV protective clothing, or not?

When you wake up the next day with your arms looking tomato red and your hands white.........time to think about long sleeves at least. BTDT If you do a lot of welding that is not flat or on a table.... time to think of stepping up to a jacket or bib.

I can only tell you about me.

Young.

Stupid (yet knowing it all)

Bulletproof.

And now, I go twice a year and have about a dozen spots shot with liquid nitrogen.

And every couple of years, have a Mohs procedure where they take out a layer of flesh, patch you up to go sit in the waiting room, analyze that flesh to determine if they put you back in the room to sew that one up or take out another layer of flesh. And one has all that time to ponder such things as, "maybe if I had just been more careful..............."

I see guys all the time welding with T shirts and short gloves and all sorts of exposed flesh. That was me years ago. And I want to go tell them what they're in store for.

Now, when I weld, I NEVER weld without wearing a khaki Wrangler long sleeved shirt, long gloves, and Huntsman full hood.

Trouble is, with cancer, it takes a long time from exposure to symptoms. And by then, you never know exactly when the exposure happened.

You don't have to get neurotic or anal about it. Just know that UV rays are proven to cause cancer, and that a little prevention now will pay off bigtime later.

Steve

I tend to wear 'V' necked shirts. 15 minutes at 100 amps will give you a nasty sunburn on the neck. The same 15 minutes will do in the pasty white undersides of your arms if you don't cover up. Ask me why I know.

For a hobbist I'd go with a plain COTTEN long sleeve work shirt buttoned up at the sleeves and neck. Jeans are fine, no cuffs. Shoes should be a minimum of ankle high so the jeans fall over the tops. Gauntlet style gloves are standard. Skip the "penny loafer" causual look, the molten slag dropped inside your shoe is not pleasant. Only takes about 6 to 8 weeks for the burn pocket to heal.

All day jobs or overhead means go> Just how big deal is UV exposure for a occasional welder like me. >

Thanks, Roy, Steve and NewsJunky. I never had any sunburn on my hands after welding, simply because I welded only for a short time. I will be more careful though. No more welding without shirts.

"Ignoramus24284" wrote in message news:8NnCg.10438$ snipped-for-privacy@fe66.usenetserver.com... | Just how big deal is UV exposure for a occasional welder like me. | | My welding (arc) time is probably 2-3 minutes per week at best. | | Should I even bother with wearing UV protective clothing, or not?

Awhile back I went and bought a pair of heavy cotton overalls. That sort of striped engineer's coveralls that look like they're from the 50's, but I wanted a general purpose overalls that I could don and get dirty and weld with. Key was the brand name. Turns out finding the overalls I wanted was harder than expected. They're big enough that they even cover my feet, and I'm already fairly tall. The idea is that I can leave on whatever I'm wearing and do a little welding, cutting, or general purpose dirty work. Yeah, they're hot, but sweat washes off, crispy skin doesn't. I've had some of that, too. Gotten slag in my pockets, ruined a bunch of shirts and pants, all that stuff, and I didn't have to make a living at it. Then there's the dance some of us know, the dingleberry dance. If we're reasonably in control, we set the stinger down in a safe place instead of dropping it while we flail away trying to get to that hot ball of fire heading toward places that rarely see light. (Hurts sometimes thinking about it!) Recently on a little task that I spent perhaps a total of half an hour welding, I failed to button the overalls and put up the collar. Dunno what I was thinking. Hell of a sunburn on my chest. Hurt for weeks. That was a gentle reminder to not forget to take the usual care.

I use those cotton sleeves, particularly when Tigging. Its hot as hell outside in my shop...so am usually wearing a Tshirt. When I need to weld..I simply pull on the sleeves and go to it. Works great, doesnt get in the way, are cheap

and work very well for this sort of thing.

Ive a leather jacket, leather sleeves and so forth..but I grab the cotton sleeves unless Im welding overhead etc, in the summer time (110F)

Gunner

"If I'm going to reach out to the the Democrats then I need a third hand.There's no way I'm letting go of my wallet or my gun while they're around."

"Democrat. In the dictionary it's right after demobilize and right before demode` (out of fashion).

-Buddy Jordan 2001

Next time you TIG weld without gloves smell your hands. They will most likely have a distinct smell. This comes from exposure to intense UV light. Your fingers will smell the strongest wher the exposure is greatest. I do not know what the chemical change is that causes the smell. ERS

Will try. I recently blowtorched a few plucked chickens, and that makes me suspect that maybe hairs burn on hands? Anyway, I will try and smell my hands to see what the smell is like.

"Ignoramus24284" wrote in

Add up all those minutes, and they turn into months. But people who don't spend a lot of time out in the sun get skin cancer. Some who never smoke get lung cancer.

I think you got the point.

Remember the government's statement:

"There's hardly ANY radiation ............"

I'd just as soon have NO radiation.

And keep my UV exposure to a minimum even if it means taking the time to put on my khaki shirts for a short bit of welding. It all adds up.

Steve

It's no wonder people weld without protection. Look at those hot rod and motorcycle build shows. Those guys are always TIG and Mig welding without gloves or long sleeves. Bugs the crap out of me. One guy I know bought a mig welder and a #11 lens. He put the lens in his torch goggles and proceeded to weld. When I saw him his face was all blistered and red. Except for the white part where the goggles protected that part of his face. I had a boss who would watch me weld between his fingers. I finally had it and would stop welding when he was near me. He finally figured it out and left me alone when welding. I know, they are his eyes and all that, but it bugged me to know he was risking his already limited sight by watching me weld. ERS

I have an old wool shirt that gets used for tig welding. It's thin enough that it isn't too hot for short welding jobs. ERS

That's the smell of burned protein. Skin or hair. Stinks. I used to smell it all the time when my beard got long and stuck out from under my shield.

Been on fire a couple of times. I hate when that happens.

One time in the summer I went to work and forgot my overshirt. Had just a white tee shirt and a big helmet. I put on my leather sleeves and welded all day with 1/4 inch E7024. It was a hot Friday. I'll never forget that burn. Two red straps on my shoulders and hot red on belly and chest. Awful. Miserable. Haven't been sunburned since and that was 30 years ago.

That's what they told me too. A monkey could MIG weld. But the hard part is in setting up the machine properly for each particular job. Once you get it set up for what you are welding the actual welding is easy. Of course, getting it set up for the job is the tricky part.

I took a community college course and didn't find it all that useful. You can learn to MIG on your own. I would say to get everything you can on welding, books, videos, personal instruction, and anything else you can find. Just try to get as much information as possible and then start practicing. Until you get time with the machine it's all just theory. Once you get your hands on it it's different. I just got a new Millermatic 210 this week and although I took the course I'm just learning what I'm doing. So far just experimenting with it and doing some practice welds with it seems better than anything else I've done so far.

Hawke