[TheForge] Stick welding

[Jerry Frost]

There've been a lot of good tips so far and listening 
to the arc is high on the list. The sound will depend 
on what you're doing though. DC should sound more like 
an air escaping hiss than frying bacon. AC should sound 
like gently frying bacon. Crackling in any case isn't 
good.

While you're practicing with pencil/pen and paper hold 
it with a pair of pliers for the full effect.

Frosty
-------------------------------
If it ain't forged
it ain't real.
Wrought iron is.
The FrostWorks

Meadow Lakes, AK.

http://www.artmetalradio.com/

From: "Jeffrey Polaski" <jeff.polaski at rgs.uci.edu>


Here are a couple of tips I picked up in welding 
class...

First, pay attention to the *sound* while you are 
welding... It's hard
to describe over email, but you want to get a sound 
like bacon frying.

Second, practice making the correct hand motions with a 
pen and paper.
The idea is to train your hand to make the right 
motions. If you are
using a crescent shape, just fill up a page or two with 
that shape using
a pen and paper. Lock your wrist and try to hold the 
pen like you would
an electrode. After doing that, switch to using the 
electrode without
any power. Just make the motions to get familiar with 
the feel of it.
The book "Modern Welding" does a good job explaining 
this

Third, try welding to failure... Be prepared to 
sacrifice some scrap and
dial it up a few notches *higher* than you should. See 
what happens when
you weld *through* your practice piece. It will give 
you a much better
idea of what the settings should be.

I don't weld much, but those tips helped out in class.

Jeff Polaski