Hello folk's. My question is: If i have four exact pieces of 5000 series aluminium to weld together, i weld two together with tig and the other two i weld with mig. Is one of these way's tougher/stronger than the other?
rodent
Not enough information. How thick? What type of joint? What are your skills doing TIG and MIG? What equipment is available? What will be the preheat temperature? Etc.
In general, either process is capable of making sound welds. The weld area will be softer than the surrounding metal. Joint design is the primary determinant of joint strength, assuming the welding is competently done.
MIG will be difficult to do competently on thin sections, and can achieve cold lap on thicker sections if the parameters aren't set just right. Cold lap *looks* like a good weld, but it isn't. A good looking TIG weld will generally be a sound weld.
MIG is a very fast process. TIG is slow. So MIG is preferred in a production setting where the parameters can be carefully optimized for a particular weld, and that weld is done over and over all day. Generally, TIG is better for one off welds, or when you need to do a widely varying sequence of welds.
Gary
MIG on aluminum causes rather severe distortion if the pieces aren't restrained while cooling. TIG causes almost no distortion.
The welds will be of similar strength, but the MIG will require some setup time to get the machine dialed in for your materiels thickness and joint.
Aluminum MIG is 90% machine settings.
Unlike MIG on steel, on aluminum your machine must be set correctly .
On steel you can fudge quite a bit by adjustingyour weld style and speed, but on aluminum this is disasterous.
With TIG the materiel heats up slower and cools slower, and youhave the visual cue so you can actually see the penetration.
Gary&Ernie, thank's for the help.
cheers rodent
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