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My goof of the day

I was tig welding some 1/8" aluminum last night and all of a sudden my welds start getting sooty, crusty, generally nasty looking..so I went to bed. This afternoon I go out and start over...new piece of aluminum, new filler rod, reground the tungsten (2% Lan) and I start getting great welds again (well..great for me)...so I burn through the first piece of filler and reach for the one I was using last night...suddenly the welds look like crap again...

So...has anyone ever tried to weld aluminum with stainless rod before?? LOL!! It looked like it was welding somewhat, but it was NASTY!!

Guess I better seperate the filler rods..again...

J
Reply to
James Arnold
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Oops. I've been there.

Reply to
John L. Weatherly

If you want to see something kind of cool. try melting som stainless steel filler into the middle of a piece of

1/4" x 2" aluminum flatbar.

As the metals cool, they start fracturing and the sound they make is quite strange.

Reply to
Ernie Leimkuhler

You know I'm gonna try that!!

Reply to
James Arnold

No, but I've tried to MIG stainless together using aluminum filler wire -- that was interesting.

The filler was extraordinarily stiff for aluminum (high magnesium content) and I just blindly grabbed it out of the box of MIG spools I keep under the bench. I was so sure it was stainless that I never even read the label.

Took me about 10 minutes to figure out why it was simply balling up and falling off the workpiece.

-- you can contact me via

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Reply to
Bruce Simpson

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