Quote Originally Posted by Steve View Post
One big thing to remember when welding aluminum is that it can get too hot. Sometimes you have to let it cool down in order to not burn through.

Another thing to watch is the first part of the weld. The tig weld will be smaller as the material is not up to heat as the end of the weld is. It seems that the weld puddle spreads out more as the weld progresses. So what I do is a little bit of back stepping for the first few inches as the material is cold. That allows it to heat up and look like the rest of the weld.

Aluminum welding will make you a better all around tig welder as aluminum magnifies the problems with set up and your method.

I was using clean 1/8" aluminum plates that were about 6" by 10". I was actually having some issues getting a stable arc. I wiped them down with acetone before I started.

I'm pretty sure it was mostly "me". I do have a little practice from early spring where I could lay decent beads. I need more rod and tungsten before I can really get back to it and trial and error what works better.