Aluminum cans

Here are some aluminum cans I welded with my Everlast Super200P.

You don't need a domestic welder to weld on light gauge aluminum. :)

Can you post some specs on how you did this.

Amps, size of tungston.

I seem to burn thru everything.

.040" lanthanated tungsten, started out sharp

1/16" (or smaller if you've got it) 4043 filler. I tried 5356, but it seemed to strangely "burn" green color, like there was some contamination, if it's not some odd materials incompatibility, must be something else I couldn't figure out, but switching to 4043 totally eliminated the problem, and I was getting nice, shiney wet flowing puddles. Use the smallest diameter filler rod you can get; I used 1/16" on my first pass, but I think one notch smaller would have worked even better. I did a second "fill the groove" pass around the first bead (just to see how well it would worked) with 3/32" 4043, seemed to still work OK. Its *very* challenging to fill holes in the super thin aluminum with the 3/32 filler rod though, much easier (still not real easy though) with 1/16" filer rod.

I used a #4 cup at 8 cfm (I used a standard collet body, but a gas lens is probably actually a good idea) You'll need to use a fair amount of stick-out to get the tungsten down in the crevice between the cans.

On machine settings, use AC and 30%+ cleaning (DCEP). (But read more about the cleaning setting in next paragraph)

Current - You'll need to dial back the current on the knob on your footpedal, to just off the minimum setting. At the *very* minimum knob setting, you won't have enough juice (regardless of pedal position) to make a puddle. I had mine at around 10-15%. Test on the end of the aluminum can for a controllable puddle you can add filler into, this will test your shielding gas settings at the same time. If you need to make a fine adjustment to reduce heat a little bit, you can do it with the cleaning/DCEP knob. Bump it from 30% up to 50%, I even tried up to 70% at one point, to reduce heat into the part, it does work as a "fine heat" control knob of sorts. The 50%-70% DCEP did melt the tip of my .040" tungsten, but I was managing OK arc starts on the .040" even with the melted tip.

Don't forget your auto-darkening helmet's shade setting. I was having trouble seeing initially through my usual (shade #11) setting. Lightening it up all the way (to shade #9) gave me a clear view.

Other tips - If you can support the cans from rolling around somehow so they don't move around when you touch them it will help a lot with getting good results. I'm thinking a footlong or so piece of angle clamped so the open end of the vee was facing up, would do the trick of supporting and grounding the cans nicely. I just butted an old file and a scrap piece of sheet aluminum on either side of my cans, (and had everything sitting on a grounded sheet of copper,) but the pieces were moving around on me at times, so it was definitely not the ideal setup.

I would have liked to use pulsing, and I tried but couldn't get it to work, maybe the low setting was extinguishing the arc and kicking high frequency starting mode back in with each pulse, or maybe the machine wasn't evening trying to pulse at such a low welding current, couldn't figure out why it wasn't working.

That is a lot of filler, but it will hold :D

Hope razor blades are next.

Thanks for posting, that shows how thin our units will run. I'm a 4043 fan myself. My son pulls 4043 from the spool gun and uses that sometimes .030 filler.

Good thing you welded the bottoms to each other, they would be tough to open if you welded the tops together. The ground clamp shown in the picture is a good one, I have the same, good grounding is a must.

I love that ground clamp, and would you believe its $10 at harbor freight (they call it "400 amp ground clamp".) It makes a good ground even just resting on some copper sheet. (I know not an ideal setup... wouldn't want to bump it off during welding!) Without a "real" metal welding table, ya find ways to make do though. :p

Mike, the 5356 wire I tried initially was 3/64 (.047") I pulled from a MIG spool. Still trying to figure out what went wrong with it, I'm now thinking it was likely just a contamination problem. (I left that spool sitting for a while near some opened oxy-acetylene aluminum flux, and it got corroded in some spots.) But I love that small 3/64" size, even for welding aluminum sheet as large as .065".

I think I can probably get better heat control if I re-jigger the footpedal a bit. (Get the on/off switch to engage at a smaller pedal travel.) I just need to keep it reliably switching "off". :)

I'd try welding another can (or maybe even some razors ;) ), but I'm trying to nurse this argon tank a little longer on "real" projects. It's getting super low.

Nice practice idea! I guess I'll have to go empty some cans....

digging up all the old threads today...