Im about to buy a welding outfit and decided to go with welding with gas(oxy/ac). I was curious as to how well does gas welds penatrate on frame/chassis work? Im going to do some frame notches and a mustang ll and a couple of crossmembers. I sold my mig so Im left with starting over in choices of mig, tig ,or gas. I also didnt like the way the mig welded sheetmetal panels so I dont want to go that route again. The tig is just out of my budget I just want the best versatilllity for the best bang for your buck. I know how to gas weld just never tried to do any thick metals. Im not a bodyshop man just a novice with a hobby for my own vehicles, so I dont really care about speed, just quality.
You want to use some type of arc process for frame work. You could get by with a cheepy 220v AC stick welder, if you have some welding skill, then use a torch for bodywork. Lotsa guys use MIG for bodywork without any trouble, maybe you should invest in some community college courses or spend more time practicing on junk panels? Did you use gas with your mig before?
Didn't like the way mig welded sheetmetal? Musta been something wrong with the setup? Use 75% argon 20% C02 and 5%oxy mix shielding gas with .023 wire....NICE welds on anything 16-22 guage.
I have one of those cheapie lincoln 110 volters it does great, no problem with most frames and not bad on sheet too if set up right On a wirefeed Small dia wire is #1, and with .030 i usually make decent size tacks and skip from place to place until it is fully welded .035 seems a little big used it at work on some home projects I really want to try smaller wire, but i havent got around to it yet Heat is the killer on sheetmetal, it'l warp the shit outa it
IMO gas welding much beyond the thickness of auto body sheet metal is ineffective. I guess metal less than 1/8" can be welded ok with gas, but I would not want to need to rely on gas welding on any structural item. I used to be "ok" at gas welding, but even so, I was never able to even weld sheetmetal without warping it more than I would like. IMO, careful spots with a mig will warp metal a LOT less than even the best gas welding. I am in no way a welding guru, I manage to barely get by, so I suppose there may be some folks who will contradict me, but speaking as an armature for armatures I say you are better off with the mig, or even better, some tigs are getting to be affordable now...
What they've all said above. I'd really look into another arc system before getting going on a frame with the gas. If you like how gas works maybe consider a TIG setup. TIG took me a while to get the handle of, but once you can run it you get a better weld and its way more versatile on different kinds of metals (steel, stainless,aluminum etc) At least if nothing else I'd throw some money down for a cheapy stick machine and really burn my welds in good with that.
You can cut, weld, braze, solder, and light cigarettes with a gas rig. You cant do much but weld with the others. I've gas welded 3/16 aplenty and had no qualms about the quality of the weld. It's just like tig welding except a bit slower and reuires a steadier hand..
Dont get me wrong. I used the right gas setup with the Lincoln HD mig but I remember In school that the weld from the oxy/ac were much cleaner. I lay descent beads with the mig but I wanted to do the gas IMO there's lots less slag to clean and I dont like to use any bondo on my sheetmetal. I want to be able to use a high build primer and thats it. Enough of my setup and skill level So most of you guy's say no to frame work with the oxy/ac welding?
Ships were built with Oxy acet welds and rivets for years before arc welding became common. Control is the determining factor. I have welded 2" plate with it and it is still holding 30 years later. It requires multipul passes, but so do other means of welding. Quarter can be welded with one pass with the right tip and rod. OP welds are no problem as long as you control your puddle. Slow? Once you have your heat up, it is just as fast as a stick. Warpage can be a problem with sheet, but it is controllable with technique. Downside? Boy, it really gets hot around all that redhot iron. Had a plastic cover lens melt and fall out on me while scarfing off a big ol booger stick weld.
How many professional car builders on this site do you think use oxy-acet. to do the kind of frame welding you are considering? (ZERO,my guesss.) MIG is the way to go.There are some units out there that will work just fine. This subframe was Mig welded with a sine wave mig welder. Don't even think about using oxy acet. for frame welding.
you know ive noticed something about these welding threads. You will get a lot of different answers. So my advice would be to go to your local community college and talk to a welding instructor. He will lead you in the right direction, altho im sure he will say with proper prep work any setup will do ya.
Ox/Acet will stick any weldable metal together with a big enough tip. Bilt a lot of cars back in the 60s with gas torch set,only thing I had. Nowdays I have Gas-TIG-MIG. Only 2 things bad about welding with Ox/Acet 1 everything near by will be red hot also and 2 gas is a expensive way to weld nowdays. Keep the gas set and get a 220 Stick buzz box also, AC/DC one if possiable.
mig is the way to go. oxy-acyt. is good for cutting,and too slow. tig is still slow and too expensive for the average small garage guy.......
Hey punkabilly1306 you know thats exactly what my old instructor said too? Well I guess Im gonna have to spend my tax return on a nice little tig.
I spent a lot of years building wrecks with a torch.... It was all that was available for a long time. Migs didn't start showing up in Body shops (at least where I grew up) til early 80's. I know a guy in Reno that can(and does) chop the top on a '36 3 window with a torch and metal finish it on BOTH sides. I don't mean metal finish and then throw a cost of mud and a bunch of high build epoxy primer.... I mean making it ready for a light coat of primer and block/paint... Having said that, you can do pretty much anything you want to with a torch providing your prepared to invest the time needed to learn the craft. Lotsa practice and plenty of forethought are needed. The big question is whether or not using a torch is practical, given the technology that exist today. In my opinion, it ain't. Mig and Tig is so much easier to master and the results are far more predictable than torch work. I'll never sell my torches, but I wouldn't bother starting a frame project without my MIG...... Rich
Anybody ever try to cut steel with an electric welder? I do it all the time with a gas outfit. Been using it to cut/weld ever since the early 60's and never saw any reason to change...and not to brag, but my welds don't break and they look pretty good, too. I guess it has something to do with old dogs learning new tricks...
BAck in the 50's and early 60's oxy/acete;ene was all we had. There are many vintage dragsters that were gas welded and then annealed and they held up without any problems. Tig & Mig are fast and easy to use but I wouldn't be afraid of a frame welded with gas if it was done properly.
I guess I'll need another mig and a gas rig. What gas rigs do you old school(gas) prefer? How about the Metco Midget or the Henrob? Or is it just staight up old school with the Smith? I have to get a gas outfit just for the versatillty of cutting, welding, and preheat. Probably just use the mig for heavy guage(structural) metal.
Cars have been available for better than 100 years, it took a while for a lot of folks to abandon horses for daily transportation. I imagine someone somewhere still uses a horse for their routine daily transportation but most people drive. If someone were to ask me if they should buy a horse instead of a car for a 30 mile round trip a few times a week, I would probably advise a car even though this trip could be done on a horse. I have a set of bottles and a torch, but I don't use it for welding anymore, even though at one time I was a fair welder with gas. To me, it is just a hell of a lot easier to lay down a quick bead with the mig.
If you're a novice, mig welding is the most versatile. You're better off buying an old miller 220v unit used than a new 110v pile of crap. Shielding gas in a must. Oxy welding is for the well practiced and even then not the best means of doing your mustang ii and other frame mods.
Gass welding is NOT structurally reliable. Arc welding would be the next cheapest route, but then your fit-up has to be damn perfect, 'cause you'll have a hard time filling gaps with arc. It'll turn into multipass untill you can fill it and that's a chore and some time. Also, that arc stick doesn't make a very long weld. Oh....I light cig's with my MIG, so the gass torch isn't all that. Cutting with a oxy torch? Steel only, my man. You'll need plasma to cut, stainless, alumn., etc... MIG is for production....that's kinda a given in the weldment world. Carl Hagan
Heavy welding with Oxy/Acetylene is a bitch. Of course you can do it but the heat reflected back from the work, due to the time it takes to get good penetration makes it a sweat-box job. Uses a lot of gas, consequently expensive. Go with the technology. Stick or Wire-feed are equally good. Stick is superior on heavy stuff, 3/8 or 1/2 inch plate will leave most wire feed machines in the dust. Wire-feed is easiest to learn than stick. MIG wire-feed is usually preferred over flux-core wire, less splatter and smoke. For you guys that might be wondering, Oxy/Acetylene and TIG are alike in hand/eye coordination, takes both hands to do. Stick and Wire-Feed are one-handed operation..
If you live in New Mexico all of the Pipe Lines for PNM are gas welded.Gas welding is great and you can weld your frame with it Just Practice first.Ive Been a welder for 8 yrs.and I first learned to weld with gas and that is the way to learn
MIG welding is very picky when it comes to rust or any other impurites so if you are going to do frame work that maybe pitted with such then maybe a stick is the way to go .I've been welding about 30 of my 45 years and found stick welding to be more foregiving than MIG.I've got a hobart 210 mig that I do everything with providing you have clean steel.
Except for pruning/cutting in where I can't get the whiz-wheel in, I don't light up the torch much anymore either. The chop-saw and die-grinder have made me lazy! I don't have a plasma, but that's certainly the quickest/best in my opinion for long cuts where a shear isn't practical.
When I was about 13 I was working at a shop building trailers and stuff like that and we always used mig for frame welding and tig for sheet metal work. Mig is way easier to operate.
You can cut steel with an arc welder. I've only messed with it in passing, but I had an instructor back in the day that used it a lot, and he said chop shops did it a lot because it was so quick and would go through most pieces of any car. I think the general view would be to use a mig welder, 220 if possible. If you're already an experienced gas welder and feel like going that route, so be it. You're gonna have a much higher heat effected zone going that route, and it'll take a while. Personally, I've never built a car frame but I've done some heavy duty carrier and cart frames. Normally mig is the way to go. It's just so much faster and easier. Stick would be my second option. -Josh
The Jalopy Journal
