Tig Welding Steel Parts on a StrongHand BuidPro Table

Tig Welding Steel and fabricating small parts

Whether you are fabricating something big that takes up the whole table, or just fixturing small parts together, modular fixturing helps.

I just tig welded 4 small steel parts on my StrongHand table...and I was reminded again, just how much I like it.

In fact, there are only 2 things I dont like about it...

1. Sometimes things fall thru the slots.
2. the rubber o rings on the fixture bolts are starting to split...I need to get some new ones

The steel parts I tig welded for this job are for the commercial aircraft industry and are built per the drawing so I needed to make sure everything is straight, plumb, and dead nuts. Otherwise the parts wont work, or they might get rejected and that would mean rework.

I am doing this welding job for a friends machine shop... and my job is just to put the parts together like a puzzle and weld them.

I like doing work for machine shops because usually the metal is clean and ready to weld.

I show up when its ready to weld or have the parts dropped off at my garage shop, weld them up, and deliver them...or have them picked up.

gravy.

But these parts are hot rolled steel and tig welding steel with mill scale on it sucks. It has to be ground off or it will be ugly...like the part in the video that I forgot to clean.

When hot rolled steel is ground clean, it welds great... just like cold rolled. But when it is not cleaned, it is like welding in a bowl of cornflakes.

I had some foot pedal issues on my tig welding machine( like it was broke) so I had no choice bit to use the torch switch. I prefer a foot pedal, but with upslope and downslope controls, and even a 4t function if I choose it, I still have a lot of control. about 130 amps was about right. ...here are the basic machine settings.

125-135 amps

3/32" 2% lanthanated electrode 2.4mm

er70s2 1/16" filler wire 1.6mm

#5 cup

10 cfh argon

When I pulse ...like when the weld is close to an edge, I increase the amperage while arcing on a piece of scrap until I get the same readout of around 130 amps of output.

Tig Welding Steel...Learn more about the Tig Finger Heat Shield in the video