History Welding History When did they start differnt types???

OK... I can see how that made sense back then.

I believe the ratio of Labor Costs and Material Costs were way different, as well...

 

Probably not, but strong enough.

 

My cousin's grandfather worked for Wanzer Milk in Chicago..he was thier master welder in the 30s--to 60s. He and my family came over from Italy and brought trades..he did ornametal iron work in his garage.
I learned to gas weld and arc in the early 60s from him..he was an artist..

I still remember smokin cigars (he ALWAYS had one..sorta like me now)..sparks..that smell of metal burnin'..workin on my first rod..

He never let me use coat hangers..he'd bring me a load of rods from work...

Wish I kept the old tanks..

 

OK... I understand.

It was just to glue two pieces of metal together, as cheap as possible.

The guy who is doing that today has a Flux Core Wirefeed...

 

One job I had, I would bend QA welding rod into coat hangers, straighten it out somewhat, and weld with it just to hear the boss yell at me.

And I read some years ago that the anylisis of coat hanger steel was similar to body steel in the 60s, but with the high strength steels in use today, I doubt if it;s still true.

 

Tig has been around for awhile, but the old guys refer to it as heliarc, cause they used helium at first not argon, and i think they stared playing around with the stick proccess in the late 1800`s, but it did not get widely used until the 20`s. A guy names tubal cain was the first known welder.

 

ok, well let the yelling begin..... it can be done, my grandfather showed me when i was a youngin' as pictured above hes welding with one. i just use em cuz i got a bizzilian laying around the house. and my grandmother gave me bags and bags of them. the unpainted ones. well ill prolly get banned for this... but oh well. anyone who has dealings with me through PM my email is posted.

 

Heli-arc was a trade name.

 

My dad found this at auction, brand new. Anyone know the age?

 

i still use my 60s buzz box, got it at a swap meet for 50 bux!

 

Can't beat the ole tombstone welder, I'll bet there have been several million hot rods/race cars put together with those.

 

Caption:

"Ohhh, that looks good so far,...oh crap,..is that my hair,...shit I'm on fire!"

 

A stand by,...Miller and Hobart still make the same kind of welder,....just your basic arc welder,...you can put some great well-penetrating welds on with that little guy!

 

Now that's a statement that I disagree with. I get upset when people compare welding (no matter what rod is used) to gluing. I know it's just an off hand comment but so many people don't really understand what welding really is. They confuse soldering, brazing and gluing. Welding is not just sticking 2 pieces of metal together if it's done right.

I hear people that don't understand say to make the cut on an angle so that the joint will have more surface area for the weld.

I don't mean to jump on you but people read this and think that the crack is still under the weld. If it is, then isn't done right. Maybe that's why my coat hanger welds held up so well.

A month ago I helped my buddy install a cat back system on his truck at a friends shop. The buzz box welder had to be from the 40s or 50s. I was scared that I'd make a mess out of it by burning through or that the welder wouldn't be hot enough to do the job. It was as smooth as silk. It's been a while since I've done any stick welding but it worked out great.

 

You are right Tommy.

I shouldn't have used that word.

 

my duece sedan has nice original electric welds on the seams where the back body panels joined. just nice straight seams on the insides with very small amount of slag. Looks to be no warpage at all. My sons 31 model A has mostly bolted panels. So must have appeared around 31' 32.I didnt know that kind of welding was done that far back.

 

I have a set of books from 1940, "Modern shop practice". In the book regarding mettalurgy /welding is a technique for using Arc welders to thaw frozen pipes!. "The principle is that of warming the pipe by the resistance of the current flowing through it." I'm not ever going to try it.

 

One guy I subcontracted for had a Miller MIG his brother had bought new around 57-58. The guys family had the owned the local Chevy dealer until closing it in 59. It was a small shop that we mostly did cars for the local Model A chapter. The cool part was all the vintage equipment he had, some of it left over from the Chevy dealer. We used that MIG daily and it had never been serviced to his knowledge. You could count a one full second pause before the wire started to feed after hitting the trigger but it worked and he's still using it..