Allright - aside from the obvious downside of added weight, is there any other reason not to have a welding helmet made of metal? Other than maybe striking an arc welder on your head? I ***ume that at one time ALL welding helmets were made of metal, because I'm going to go out on a limb here and ***ume that we were welding long before the discovery of the plastic tree. Maybe someone can give me a history lesson? The reason I ask is that I stumbled on an old art project from college metal sculpture. The details are fuzzy, but I made a helmet out of a 1943 Delta drill press hood I found, and it's so cool and art-deco/rocketeer looking, I'd love to have an excuse for wearing it all the time. I thought maybe I could give it new life as a welding helmet, but got to wondering what some of the reasons they are all made of plastic for. Thanks for insight... I've had a few beers and right now this seems like a good idea ...
for 1 it will get really hot after welding for awhile also the arc will reflect under the mask making for bad flash burn slag will stick to it and if it touches your work it could ground out well those are just the start of what imthinkin
My dad was a pipeline welder. 50 years with Local 798 out of Tulsa. The welding helmets he used were always Jackson and made of what was known as fiber-metal. Some of the welders used a "pancake" hood. It was only a circular piece of material with a piece made to fit around your eyes, much like swim goggles. Of course these didn't keep hot slag from popping down on your face and neck. Took a real "MAN" to weld with one of these. I still have my dad's last hood he had when he p***ed away. Very well used.
Iwas an aircraft welder for 40 yrs & we made our helments out of alum & as small & tight around our face as possible. Some of the guys put leather skirts on them that could cover the neck. Painted black so no reflection . These were small so you could weld on & inside engines in confined spaces & no one got shocked .
alot also used full leather helmets with goggles rivited to the leather, steal helmet would be to heavy, just make it a cool face sheild for grinding
Id say the metal would get hot and radiate inside the helment making it even more uncomfortable......and the condensation would be more as well...all that heavy breathin we do.......For small jobs I think the tight fitting aluminium one you mention sounds like a good idea......I wear a migomag helment all day and they are light and comfy.....well, as comfy as one can get doin this....cheers, Bert
I made my own out of aluminum, painted it with engine paint and pinstriped it...next time i'll make it a little less bulky/large...but it's way more durable than any plastic helmet in a MN winter...
I've seen pics of old welding masks,obviously riveted together. No idea on the material. -- If you paint the inside of any welding helmet flat black, it doesn't reflect the light as badly.Painting the outside Silver,reflects a lot of heat.Definitely noticeable in the Summer.
i use a old card board helmet thats riveted .. slag just jumps off that thing and it dont get burnt like new plastic helmets
two pictures from 1942, from the Library of congress Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/
I use a 25 yr old helmet like the bottom one & it's a fibergl***-like material, still gets heavy after 15min of welding. I like Fatcaddy's idea to make a grinding shield outta your project. You can get the clear plastic lenses from Eastwood or maybe even Sears.
I have 2 aluminum helmets and 1 magnesium helmet that I made. All 3 are custom painted also. The mag helmet is real light, you dont even know its there! Never been shocked, and they get no hotter inside than a new Miller helmet does. Tim @ www.irrationalmetalworks.com
Wow Dudes! Thanks for the input and ideas and PICUTRES. Those dudes are bad***. I'm going to have to give this some thought abviously. Right now the helmet has no eyeholes at all, so it's pretty open to interpretation. The face shield is a pretty neat idea. I gotta do something with it, it's too cool to just gather dust.
My first helmet back in the 60's was a hand me down given to me by an old railroad worker my dad knew. I still have it. Its the fiber-cardboard style shown on that picture. Light as hell. I too used to tape a piece of leather to the bottom of the helmet to prevent flashburns on my neck. Welding for eight hours straight and doing alot of reaching, its easy to expose your neck to the flash. Those old pictures remind me of my pressure vessel welding I used to do.
my fav helmet is the huntsman vulcanized fiber. its like cardboard riveted together, you can get them with a small flip up lense, a small slide down lese, a large slide down lense, a large flip up lense and both large and small fixed lense. i keep one for work and one for home, they are all i will ever buy anymore, you can drop them and they dont get destroyed no matter how cold it is. they are semi flexible and wont break, pretty lightweight, they wont melt. whatever you do, just dont get it wet. oh they look cool as **** too. im sure that style and material has been around for many many years.
All this time I ***umed they were metal, I never would have dreamed they were cardboard, or fiberboard or anything. Learn something new everyday!
Metal, steel helmets would just rust badly when welding! Nah, they would just be way too heavy. I had to tape dark colored rags all around my welding helmet when welding inside car trunks, and installing floor pans into cars. The mig welder arc reflects badly into the eyes off the inside of the lens. Welding burns of the eyes hurts like a mommyf****r!
Thank you guys for sharing an interesting information. I would like to see more vintage photos like these, it is good to know that welding has such an history in America.
Ditto! we always used the "pancake" hand made for seeing your weld without sunlight sneaking in while doing all positions in the ditch. Back at the bench, the old tried & tru "Huntsman" was the only way to go, flip or std. lens. I retired out of Local #250 in L.A. in 1984.
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