How To Weld Sheet Metal With A Wire Feed Welder
A wire feed or tig welder is ideal for sheet metal but we will assume that you don t have one.
How to weld sheet metal with a wire feed welder. The real trick to weld sheet metal is to use a wire feed. 1 16 i will be welding on the low 1 setting with the wire speed set to 7. We need to establish what is considered thin metal. Just kidding this tip is to explain how to weld sheet metal with a stick welder.
Mig welding for thin metal. Mig welding uses an arc of electricity to create a short circuit between a continuously fed anode the wire fed welding gun and a cathode the metal being welded. You can buy whole sets of wire feed welders which come with guns and a variety of wires. 2 prepare the metal.
It is an arc welding process that where you feed a solid wire electrode through a. Since the sheet metal for our container is a fairly thin gauge approx. On the thin sheet metal like you are asking about 023 025 e70s6 bare wire with 75 25 argon co2 is the best. As a rule when mig welding sheet metal never use a body filler metal that is thicker than the base metal.
The wire should melt off into the weld puddle at an even rate and make a steady crackling noise as you go. With these materials use a tri mix gas 90 helium 8 argon and 2 co 2. Mig is one of the best ways to weld 20 gauge sheet metal. All you have to do to figure out wire feed speed is press the trigger and count thousand one thousand two thousand three.
Wire feed welding calls for a good welding gun. When welding 304 stainless steel er308 er308l and er308lsi wires are compatible but for welding 316l stainless you need a 316l wire. The hobart 500559 handler 140 mig welder 115v or lincoln electric k2278 1 handy core are some of the good ones you can go for. The wire feed welder speed will probably be not much over 100 ipm inches per minute.
Mig welding is one of the simplest to use for welding. As the metal you are welding increases in thickness you will want to increase the voltage and wire speed as you see fit. It is recommended that a welder should use 023 or 024 inch wire for light gauge sheet metal work. Https amzn to 37bevj1 while wire feed welding sheet metal go for short bursts of welding instead of a going on a long bead.
To weld sheet metal with solid wires use electrode positive ep or reverse polarity. Count to six and measure the wire that came out. Sheet metal has usage in sectors like making automobiles airplane wings and fuselages roofing and medicinal tables.