side-by-side bike

Hey, you're just the chap I want to talk too.

Welding thin bike frame tubing? How easy was it with a Mig? I'm going to build a recumbent from old bikes and do not have the facilities to store oxy/act. I figured I might just be able to get away with mapp/air, but It's going to be tricky. Fine for smaller stuff, but doing a fillet braze might prove difficult. I'd been steered away from a stick or mig welder, but you obivously had no trouble blowing holes in the tube......but you're probably an experienced welder anyway :-)

Enjoyed looking at that.

Garry

I was using 4130 tubing that came in a box of practice tubing from a homebuilt airplane company. I had no problem welding that with my

I like oxy/acetylene brazing to join EMT, but it takes a little longer to light the torch, adjust it, and get the rod in place, then it does to just pull the trigger on a mig. The brazing looks a lot better, though. I have a little plumber-style oxy/acetylene pair of bottles, and I think that would be plenty to do a bike. When I took my welding class, one of the things I would do to prepare was fishmouth a whole bunch of EMT, then take it in and braze and weld it together. If it's fitted and jigged, it's really not that hard.

That was when I was thinking about building an airplane, before I decided I had better things to do for the next three years. I don't know what an FAA inspector would say about a mig-welded fuselage. I don't think it would really cut your build time by much, though.

Dave Wilson