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speed of stick vs oxy

Hi All,

I'd be curious to know what type of speed difference a good experienced welder would see between using arc vs oxy.

Let's say the material is 3/16 thick steel angle in a variety of configurations. (Man those inside corners are tough with all the heat build up and popping. Lots of nice pretty orange metal though!)

Both weld setups are appropriate for the material being welding. Say #4 tip for the oxy and 1/8 7018 rod with~90-110 amps for the stick?

I'm thinking oxy takes 2.5 to 3 times longer than stick, but that is me and I am not a "good experienced" welder. I have way more stick time than oxy but I think oxy is "more fun" and I am getting better.

Jay

Reply to
JJ
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That's true but I have to admit that my oxy-acetylene rig doesn't see much use these days aside from some brazing and heat-treating small items.

MIG makes welding most materials just so simple (and cheap), TIG does the job that oxy used to do when neatness and control are important, and my plasma cutter means I seldom need to cut with oxy.

However, I was recently on one of those TV shows where you build stuff out of scrap (I can say no more) and I was gobsmacked to find that the simple task of brazing a copper tube onto a stainless pipe was a major problem because the oxy-acetylene gear only had a cutting torch available.

It's little jobs like this that keep me hanging onto the oxy gear in my workshop -- even though I have to lease the bottles and it costs me over a hudred bucks a year to do so.

-- you can contact me via

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Reply to
Bruce Simpson

Uh...I don't wish to appear ungrateful and I appreciate you guys taking the time to reply but:

I am familiar with the pros and cons of the various types of welding and have done (and own) TIG, MIG, Stick and Oxy-fuel welding but I am not yet good enough to be certified in any of them. I have a pretty good idea of how fast TIG, MIG and Stick are for ~3/16" angle but I've only done/seen gauge thickness steel welded in Oxy-Fuel

I guess the way I should have ask the question is "If we got the Doc Savage of welding, how much faster would he be welding 3/16" angle with Stick than with Oxy-fuel?"

Thanks

Jay

snipped-for-privacy@nadasppam-yahoo.com (JJ) wrote:

Reply to
JJ

Hey Randy, thanks for the inches per minute numbers. I hope someone knows an in/min or ratio for stick vs oxy. And see the time it would take for me to do 2 inches is probably longer than for someone who is reasonably good. :-)

Jay

Reply to
JJ

"It depends". If the weld is a full penetration butt weld, there would be little difference between the two, if you take into account the possibility of clean up.

If you are talking about fillet welds, as in tee joints, I will guess that the Electrode would be about three times as fast.

For a corner to corner joint, I am guessing the electrode would still be twice as fast.

One welding instructor I had claimed he could do a code quality joint with oxyacetylene on 2" pipe, and have it finished before someone using stick had finished the root pass.

Reply to
Wayne Bengtsson

Here's my swag at the the question: Properly sized rod/wire and equipment and a good operator in a production environment on

3/16" material you should be able to see:

-MIG 20"-25"/minute

-Stick 15" per minute (minius the rod change over time)

-Tig 1"-2" per minute

-Oxy 1"-2" per minute (Usually less because you don't use a big enough tip. )

All these times are middle of the road, do not include any set up time, helmet flipping time, arm positioning time, etc

Cheers.

JJ wrote:

Reply to
Roy Jenson

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