Aluminium welding info

[alfiestorm]

I can arc weld to a good standard but never tried welding aluminium and as aluminium is a major part in streetfighters subframes etc I thought it a good idea to get myself kitted out with a mig set up so I can do all my own welding after some practise of course.

The link below gives some good advice:D


http://www.mig-welding.co.uk/aluminium-welding.htm

[Booster]

If you want to weld aluminium , the ac/dc tigs on ebay are good .
mig is ok for aluminium truck bodies but if you want neat and can oxy weld tig is easy.

[crazymofo]

biggest thing i cant stress enough when ally welding is ensuring the ally is SPOTLESS!!

use a BRAND NEW cutting wheel, BRAND NEW flapper disc, and a BRAND NEW stainless steel wire brush, obviously the cutting wheel to cut, flapper disc to clean up, and scrub the area down with the brush. if you need to file down anything, use a new file too... and once youve used these things on ally, mark em as such, and keep em aside for ally only in the future.

sounds anal, but welding will be 50 million easier and better looking. any impurities usually cause holes (blow out) in the ally, and the weld can get chunky and blotchy.

cheers.joe.

[shift1313]

one thing also to add on to crazymofo is doing use sanding discs. they can actually embed silica into the aluminum and will cause big problems when you weld, sorta like welding on cast parts that have sand in them.

Ive used a mig spool gun and its really a waste of money unless you are doing large items and arent looking to do a pretty weld. You can get the beads to look good but the gun is rather bulky since you have to have the feed at the gun(soft wire wont travel through the line like steel).

If you have an old stick machine you can get a high freq generator and a water cooler(opt) and get setup that way. Or you can get your check book out and buy a tig thats already setup for the job.

Acetone is also widely used as one of the last steps in cleaning. I personally use scotch brite pads on a die grinder to do my cleaning(as long as they are soley used for aluminum or brand new).