Blobby Blobby Blobby.

[currylager]

Just when i am getting on top of things my welder has decided to throw a wobbler and is spattering and producing blobby welds, the metal is clean, have plenty of gas and have fitted a new nozzle, but still the same. I'm wondering whether there is a defect with the welder, could be a fauly rectifier feeding the wire feed??. Any feedback/experiences would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Till]

Hi dude, what make of welder is it? How long you had it? It could be all manner of things. Check your wire feed tensioner,is the wire clean with no surface rust?There could be some crud down the shield making contact with nozzle holder.It might need a new liner,thats why asked what make it is.If it's a little diy kit you could probably get a liner from halfords.It could be the little relay on the circuit board,somtimes the contacts get burnt,especially if you been doing alot of stop starts.You can gently prise the cover off and clean the contacts with some very fine sandpaper,try this as a last resort though,if you bugger it up you'll need a new circuit board. Hope you sort it. Oh yeah,try cleaning the bearing which pushes the the wire into the feed wheel.

 

[speedwell68]

Are you getting good contact with your earth clamp? I found the earth clamp that came with my SIP Mig Mate was ***** and I replaced it with a decent one with a really strong spring. Another thing I noticed was that the welder worked better with the clamp as close to the weld as possible,

 

[Till]

Oh yeah,good thinking that man :?

 

[currylager]

Before i even attempted to add more blobs to my bus i re-terminated the earth cable to clamp and dismantled the torch and checked it over. Hey presto.....more blobs, so i swopped my new nozzle for an old one i'd used previously and the welding was much better, i bought five tips of Ebay for £4.00 and i'm beginiing to think theyre a load of fxxxxin *****.I thought welding tips wouldnt suffer from quality issues, but perhaps i'm wrong?, the welder is a Clarke 150TE which was reported on as being a good buy by the practical classics magazine, think the welder is OK. Thanks for all the help, looks like i need somewhere to get some decent nozzles from :roll:

 

[pete nice]

I have got a clarke welder, It took me ages to get it to weld right. I fitted a teflon liner as the were came through the side of the original on the first day!
I use a big bottle of gas, taht helps loads. What size wire are you using? I wa susing 0.6 but have gone to 0.8 it's loads better now. Make sure the wire slips through the tip easily & the shroud is in front of the tip.

Keep the tip away from the metal a little bit when you weld.

Without unsulting your knowledge of welding as I don't know you from Adam, but if you are welding from right to left in a line, have the tip facing left as you go, so you push the weld rather than pull it if you know what I mean. You will be able to see what you are doing clearly too.

 

[speedwell68]

Before i even attempted to add more blobs to my bus i re-terminated the earth cable to clamp and dismantled the torch and checked it over. Hey presto.....more blobs, so i swopped my new nozzle for an old one i'd used previously and the welding was much better, i bought five tips of Ebay for £4.00 and i'm beginiing to think theyre a load of fxxxxin *****.I thought welding tips wouldnt suffer from quality issues, but perhaps i'm wrong?, the welder is a Clarke 150TE which was reported on as being a good buy by the practical classics magazine, think the welder is OK. Thanks for all the help, looks like i need somewhere to get some decent nozzles from :roll:

I found that with the tips, they one it came with was ace. I then bought a couple of 'generic' unbranded ones. Now I just use the genuine SIP ones.

 

[currylager]

I have got a clarke welder, It took me ages to get it to weld right. I fitted a teflon liner as the were came through the side of the original on the first day!
I use a big bottle of gas, taht helps loads. What size wire are you using? I wa susing 0.6 but have gone to 0.8 it's loads better now. Make sure the wire slips through the tip easily & the shroud is in front of the tip.

Keep the tip away from the metal a little bit when you weld.

Without unsulting your knowledge of welding as I don't know you from Adam, but if you are welding from right to left in a line, have the tip facing left as you go, so you push the weld rather than pull it if you know what I mean. You will be able to see what you are doing clearly too.

If the metal is thick then i find pushing is best, if the metal is thin or fragile i find pulling has less tendency to burn through, i should have a degree in welding by now, have got through 3 pub bottles of C02 and 7 reels of 0.8mm wire , i,m sure the electric bill will be a bit steeper too!!

 

[currylager]

Before i even attempted to add more blobs to my bus i re-terminated the earth cable to clamp and dismantled the torch and checked it over. Hey presto.....more blobs, so i swopped my new nozzle for an old one i'd used previously and the welding was much better, i bought five tips of Ebay for £4.00 and i'm beginiing to think theyre a load of fxxxxin *****.I thought welding tips wouldnt suffer from quality issues, but perhaps i'm wrong?, the welder is a Clarke 150TE which was reported on as being a good buy by the practical classics magazine, think the welder is OK. Thanks for all the help, looks like i need somewhere to get some decent nozzles from :roll:

I found that with the tips, they one it came with was ace. I then bought a couple of 'generic' unbranded ones. Now I just use the genuine SIP ones.

The nozzles i have had best results from were SIP too funnily enough, just hope i can find someone local who can supply me with some :roll:

 

[speedwell68]

Halfords stock SIP stuff.

 

[currylager]

Halfords stock SIP stuff.

Went to halfords today, they only had 0.6mm tips typical!!!, had a choice of 100 smelly airfresheners or furry steering wheel covers tho!!, went to my local welding supplier and got some parweld tips, it will be interesting to see what they are like!!!

 

[speedwell68]

I always use .7mm wire n' tips, so I would have been buggered too. But hey at least I could buy some chav style neon lights for my washer jets.

 

[pete nice]

You can drill out the smaller tips...