I went to a friends tonight and we decided to try and box my LCA's and my Panhard bar.

Using his his mig welder and some 1/2" Rigid EMT and inserting it in my PHR was the idea. Every time we tryed to weld it, the welds we real weak. They werent basically "sticking" to the EMT. So.......

Off the the lca's. Trying to use some 1/8" X 1 1/2" steel plate to box my lca's we were having the same problem. We tried cleaning and sanding down the metal but the weld still were not sticking. We were trying to do this on the car. Im just going to take them off and send them to his shop to have them done.

He did the same on his car and didnt have any problems? I know nothing about MIG welding.

Anyone have any ideas?

 

Turn up the heat and feed the wire faster.
Also is the wire compatable with the type of metal you are using?
Kory

 

We had it on level 4 out of 5 for heat and 5 out of 7 for wire feed.

Its a 110v welder and when we turned it up to 5 the circuit would trip. Its a 20 amp recept. circuit. But even for the few moments it would work on level 5 it still wasnt tripping.

Thanks though.

 

sounds like you need to learn how to weld. emt will not strengthen anything first of all, you need mild steel tubing or dom steel tubing, and before you weld anything it needs to be clean bare metal before you even try tacking stuff in place.

 

think i'll second the learn how to weld before trying to weld on something that matters.

 

As already mentioned, EMT tubing won't strenthen anything. It's a thin wall, easily bendable alloy steel (non-structural steel), and it has a galvanized coating, which makes it difficult to weld. Get some good clean mild steel for this. As far as your LCA's, as long as the metal you were using was clean mild steel, it should have welded in fine. You should try practicing on some similar thickness scrap pieces to get a ball park setting on your MIG welder before trying the actual welding on your car. Generally when welding upside-down with a MIG, you'll want to increase your wire speed slightly. A 110v welder should be able to handle the job.

 

I didnt ask for your smart *** comments ede and six pack. Im not doing the welding

Im not the welder. And notice it says 1/2" RIGID emt. Pay alittle more attention next time before you want to talk ****.

This site is getting so damn old. All everyone wants to do is talk down to someone. If i knew how to weld then i wouldnt be asking questions here. I think i can figure that out myself. But when you want to ask something you always have to worry about some ****** like yall acting like smartass's. Im surprised one of of did get search happy



You could have just sayed that sixpack and been done.

 

use a grinder on both pieces and get the coating off........ but i wouldnt use that tubing if it were my car..... mild steel...

 

Where do you get mild steel?

I had some 1 1/2" x 1/8" thick steel plate i was wanting to use to just box it.

 

sorry you think i was tlaking sh**, i just call it as i see it, my thoughts after reading your first post were exactly that, someone need to learn how to weld. knowing how to weld is more than just pulling the trigger and laying down beads, theres alot more to it. for instance what materials can and cannot be welded together succesfully as you've found out with your emt and mild steel combo.

for steel distributers in your area try this link
http://aolsvc.yp.aol.com/main.adp?_d...=43&_dirpid=67

 

Sixpack, i was skeptical about the Rigid welding for 2 reasons. Number 1 is that it is galvinized and number 2 is that its shipped from the plant with a coating of oil. The guy doing it didnt think it would be a problem.

I think im going to just take them off this weekend and have a local do it. What type of metal is needed to box them.

Mild steel? What thickness?

 

some cold rolled mild steel at least the same thickness as the arms is fine, you could go slightly thicker too, but the absolute thickest i would use is 3/16.

i forgot you said you had some 1/8 plate, that should work fine also, but if you had issues trying to get it to weld before, i would tend to think the welder you guys were using was not working well, assuming everything was clean to start. when i first learned to weld, dirty metal caused me more problems that anything. now whenever i weld something i either grind it with my makita grinder with a flap disc or sand it with my high speed die grinder with a 3m roloc sanding disc and then clean it with brake clean to get all the oils off. this makes life so much easier when welding.

 

Must be the welder b/c the steel plate was clean as a whistle. Couldnt cost to much to have a local box them off of the car you think?

 

I’m with the “learn to weld” and “EMT won’t add much strength” geeks…

I’d like to add:
- welding into the zinc coating isn’t that hard, it just spatters a little, the BIG problem is that the yellow gas that’s given off is seriously poisonous and just a small bit of that inhaled will make you sick with “zinc poisoning.” If you’re unlucky enough that there is some chrome in there you can bet on some heavy metal poisoning. Next time you want to weld something with a coating like that I’d suggest either totally grinding off the coating within a couple of inches of wherever you’re going to weld or just removing it completely (soak the part in muriatic acid, it will take the coating off without dissolving much of the steel).
- Make sure everything is clean and you probably won’t be able to get a good weld with them on the car if you’re not a seriously good welder, and even then you’d be lucky if you don’t melt the bushings.
- From your description it sounds like you have the polarity on the welder reversed. Lucky guess, some either swapped from flux core to mig wire or vice versa and didn’t swap polarity.

 

good point, i forget about flux core wire since i never use it.

 

not much i would think, hell ive done more welding than that is gonna take for a case of beer, lol.

 

i'm confused 91 gta didn't you post this:

Anyone have any ideas?

i gave you mine along with several others and as it stand it's sound advice. you're the one that couldn't find your *** with both hands in the dark when it comes to this topic not me and not the others who have replied.

didn't you also post this:



Im not the welder. And notice it says 1/2" RIGID emt. Pay alittle more attention next time before you want to talk ****.

it's pretty clear you don't have a clue what your choice of material is or what it's good for. since you seem to be a lot more knowledgeable than me and the rest of the people who took the time to reply i tihnk i'll leave you with your vast knowledge and resources to draw on so i and no one else here interfers.