The end of the last roll and the current roll of welding wire (Lincoln .03 flux core from Home Depot) have been fouling. I tired searching but nothing came up, it didn't help I don't quite know how to describe it so here is a picture: (Click for a larger view) There doesn't seem to be much of a pattern to it happening. I am using a Miller 135 110v and welding 18 gauge with the voltage and feed set to 3. Is this the result of bad wire or some error on my part? I have the tension set a 3 and the liner is relatively new, I have also tried new tips. Thanks, Ryland
Looks to me like something is holding it up causeing it to bundle liner tip ect. Also try loosening the tension a bit see if that helps and make sure your wire speed isnt to high causeing it to not be able to burn fast enough???? And make sure your wire roll is seatened properly
I have no experience with flux core wire welding. Having said that -I do however have a lot with solid wire mig welding....I wonder if the problem could be the roll needing a bit of drag on it so it does not overide the pull of the wire feed when you do stitch welds such as thejerky motion caused by the trigger in stitching process.... Also it is not bad to use a 35 tip on 30 wire to help....
My biggger older Miller is different, and uses solid .035 wire, so if that wire is bending up between the drive rollers and the liner, then the liner needs cleaning out IMO. My Miller has a very short piece of that coiled liner, acting as a guide between the drive rollers and the quick disconnect liner/gun ass'y. That short piece sometimes gets filled with microscopic metallic dust from the wear at the rolls and wearing at that guide tube. When it's plugged, you can barely push a piece of mig wire through. If yours does not have the shorty guide liner, take the wire out of the entire liner and blow though backwards with high pressure air. Then manually keep running a fresh cut end of wire back through it to loosen more dust, and repeat with air.
i say your tension is set to tight, you should be able to stop the wire at the tip and with the trigger pulled the rolls should slip, if the wire doesnt slip in the rolls you end up with birds nests.
I had this exact thing happen. For the life of me I couldn't figure it out, then the guy at my welding supply shop said I needed to replace the liner. I said but the welder doesnt have very many hours on it, how could it be shot? He said trust me, change the liner. So I did, and it hasn't fouled since then.....LOL Scot
I have used gum cutter to clean the liner. Remove the wire and use the red plastic straw on the can and squirt it down the liner. You'll probably get a lot of black shit out of it. I don't know about 110 units but if the gum cutter doesn't help, you may have to replace the liner.
The other end of this is if it's too tight, it will "roll" the wire and cause waves that foul it in the tip of the welder. Kinda like exrtuding something.
another good reason to have the wire slip before making birds nests is safety, if a birds nest of wire happens to find the ground stud you end up with a ball of hot wire inside your machine, another easy way to check tension is to cut the wire off flush with the tip and hold the tip against a piece of wood so no wire can come out, pull the trigger and if the wire doesnt slip and your wire starts balling up slack off the tension, even if your liner is plugged the wire should never ball up.
I've had this problem with my Lincoln before. Seems its usually either a dirty tip (tiny speck of spatter up inside it) or tension. It was doing it to me today a bit, with gas though. The roll is getting down there, and I think the tension needs adjusted again to compensate for the lighter roll of wire.
Never seen a 135 but the bigger units and suitcases have a wire guide on the outlet side of the drive roller as well.
Millermatic 35, an OLD model. Teaching others to MIG weld I find that this birds nest happens when the heat range is set too low. The poor contact of the wire causes a slow arc, slow weld, and the rollers keep feeding wire into the liner quicker than the weld consumes it. Sort of back up at the rollers. I guess this is just another reason added to the above.
guys; i have to throw out some "attaboys" for not blasting flux core. it's what i use, it's what i have, it's all i got. thank you.
If you hold the tip to close to what you're welding the splatter will bounce back and stick on your tip at the wire exit thus sticking the wire, resulting in bunching of the wire before it goes through the guide tube.. Try holding your tip a little further away from what your welding.. I hope this makes sense.. I love my flux core welder........
I had this problem with solid wire on a Lincoln years ago. The liner and tip would foul after a very short time. After changing a liner I decided to test a wiper on the wire and do it now always. I get a small binder clip about 3/4" long and a pc of felt about 1" x 3". I fold the felt into a 1" square and push it around the wire (like a C) and cover it with the binder clip. This is placed between the roll of wire and the feed roller assy. Then, I saturate the felt with WD40. This not only cleans the wire, it somewhat lubes the liner. My current Miller is on the original liner and have about 6 rolls thru the machine. I seem to recall that fluxcore wire may have a irregular finish and the .035 tip may be necessary. Could possibly open an old one up with a No.60 drill and test. It looks to me like the picture shows a heat mark between the roller and the collapsed wire, this would indicate that the wire had grounded and burned at the roller. Check your tourch and make sure the shield is insulated from the torch/wire. J
It happens when the wire accidentally catches at the tip, from burnback. I have dealt with it many times. loosen the drive rolls some (as mentioned above) and let the wire stick out a little more, hold back from the work just a little, and the burnback won't happen quite as often.
Pull nozzle and tip off. Pull wire out of liner. Clean liner, I clean mine with carb cleaner or brake cleaner with straw. blow out with compressed air. Clean/degrease rollers, check tension, replace with new tip, replace cleaned nozzle, it should be good to go. Run a bead on some scrap and dip the hot nozzle.
X51 on the liner. Back in the day when I had one of these, it would do that. The liner fixed it, every time.
Once you've cleaned the liner, install a folded piece of felt held in place with a clothes pin at the opening of the liner. This will help keep your wire clean as it feeds into the liner. Been using this trick on my inexpensive Kragen flux core mig welder for years with no problems.
Know how straight the line is from the welder to the work and how the lead will lay and to not bind or pinch the liner as you work. Buy a bag of Lubrimatic felt wire wipers and the can of wire lube that goes along. Just do it. Know your local welding supply house and make a friend. Buy supplies there. In the long term, the savings will pay off in the end. Liner tips from others are possibly correct and are good tips for maintenance expenses.
Flip your roller. One side is for flux core wire and the other is for regular mig wire. Also check your ground. A bad ground will cause that also.
50 fish got it right...keep your liner clean ... go to weld supply... get one of those wire cleaners..kinda like fish said , but shaped in a roll. get instructions from sales person on it....the other guys tips should be checked also, but that line needs to be clean. you will be suprised at the dirt on wire...ps . keep wire plastic wrapped till use .. junk flux is a drag........burnt a pickup bed full of spools is this wire at shipyard...kev
ive had many nests happen in my little mig when the tip gets bunged, or just a poorly wound spool of wire, but ive never had the wire do something like that.. looks to have arced out on the wheel and bent..
Use what you want, but after reading this, I don't think I want to get brake cleaner near anything that would get hot -> http://www.brewracingframes.com/id75.htm I took my truck to get the annual inspection and they were cleaning oily spots on the floor with a can of brake cleaner. Spray it, drop a rag on it, and wipe it using their foot. Can't say I've ever seen that before.
Welding tin with inner-shield wire is tricky. Especially if your spot welding. Because its so messy(the wire itself and the spatter) you will burn through tips and liners a lot more than solid metal wire. As mentioned in previous posts always check the tip and replace the liner. I ran into a similar problem with inner-shield a few years ago. I was using a lincoln ln25 and the wire kept jamming at the tip every 10' or so. That would cause it to nest up in the feeder every now and then. When the wire sticks at the tip, the rollers keep spinning. This can cause a flat spot in the wire. Once you break the wire free and start welding again, that flat spot will reach the tip and get stuck.......again.....and again.......and again. Causing a lot of frustration and wasting a lot of wire. Thats just another thing to look for before you go buy a new liner and such.
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