Welding Positioner Tips

In the early 1990s, I switched industries from pipe welding to aerospace overhaul and that involved a pay cut.

I went from around 18 bucks per hour to around $11.50

I knew that going in, but I figured it would be worth the pay cut in the long haul.

It was a great job and I worked lots of overtime to make up the gap.

…but the gulf war started and all overtime was halted.

So I got a job moonlighting at a local sheet metal fab shop.

I made even less per hour moonlighting but I needed the money and it helped.

After a year of that, I decided to buy my own tig welding machine and start my own welding side hustle.

So I bought a Miller Syncrowave 250 with running gear, dual flowmeter,  Dynaflux cooler and 20 style water cooled torch. All for around 2500 dollars.

Right away I got some work thru word of mouth at my day job.

After a short time, I got a few more small machine shops as customers and more work than I could handle.

So  by investing 2,500 dollars in my own TiG welder,  I went from punching a clock at a second job and making 11 bucks an hour on someone else’s schedule…

To working in my own garage on my own schedule with my own equipment and making 40-50 dollars per hour.

It was way better for Family life too because of the flexibility on when I welded....Sometimes I could even put in a couple hours after the kids went to sleep.

I had to think long and hard about buying that first TIG welder but it was one of the best decisions of my life and was probably the best return on investment I ever made.

I even took out a loan to buy it but I paid that off in just a few months with money from side jobs.

Learn more about this affordable tig welder with bonus kit at weldmonger.com

In my opinion, the primeweld 225 is one of the best choices in affordable tig welders.

The problem with most other really affordable tig welders is usually the foot pedal and the torch are just bad and clunky.

Primeweld went to extra expense to include genuine ck torches with superflex hoses along with a smooth SSC style foot pedal.

They also have a responsive primeweld equipment users group on facebook and also have demonstrated great customer support

Watch some primeweld videos and you will see what I mean.

I really liked getting short production runs parts where material was already purchased and machined and my job was strictly to assemble and weld the parts.

One of those short production runs was a batch of 200 small round stainless parts.

I needed a turntable but not knowing if I would ever get more round parts I didn’t want to spend the money so I cobbled together a DIY welding lathe out of an old 10 speed bike.

By putting it in 10th speed, and using a 1/4” mandrel spinning against the rubber tire, I was able to control the speed well enough to weld that batch of parts a lot better and quicker than I could have welding by hand on a bench.

Then on the next order, I stepped out and bought a used Gentech welding lathe off eBay.

As often happens, those orders dried up, but other jobs came along and I never regrettted buying that welding lathe.

Since then I have used a few more different turntables and have learned a few tips and tricks in using them.

One main thing I had to learn quickly is how to determine rotation speed.

since most of my welding positioners dont have digital readout for RPMs, I figured out a down and dirty way to get really close on travel speed before I welded an actual part.

I simply just get a piece of tape and mark 1/8" increments.

Next I count off seconds and adjust speed until I get one increment per second on the tape passing my the tungsten tip.

This works great for most round aluminum parts but sometimes I have to make slight adjustments for stainless or other steel.

But it gets me close enough to get started without screwing up the first part.