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Wednesday 21 June 2017

Dave's Tips

How to identify TIG rods.

I thought i'd do some short videos to show a few little tricks which help you get along as a welder, some of you may already know what I am telling you in the video but hopefully I can help someone with my information here.
The first video shows you a method which I use to identify which of the most common two Tig filler rods is which, most filler rods are identified with a four digit code but some are not, and anyhow if you happen to burn off the bit with the identification on, you would be left guessing what you have in your hand, if you are anything like me, in a busy welding workshop environment and you have lots of partly used rods on your welding table and you just want to get that job finished and don't want to get a new rod from the tube, here's what to do. The most common Tig filler rod for Aluminium is 4043 the next most common is 5356.
A word of apology though, I have just watched the video through again and realised that I have shown you the wrong side of the identification on the 5356 rod so it does not say 5356 on the side you see, it did on the other side,sorry, I am a better welder than I am video maker!

Wednesday 7 June 2017

Aluminium Road and MTB frame repairs

Repairs to Aluminium Road and MTB frames.



I have been doing repairs on bike frames for quite a while now. On MTB's it tends to be cracks which have appeared over time or maybe since a big collision. On a Road bike frame it's mainly damage to the rear drop-out and derailleur hanger. Todays job was on a Commencal hardtail Mtb frame where the top of the seat tube had broken off completely just above the original weld.

The paint had to be removed from the frame near to where I was going to be welding.
The broken top of the tube was re-attached using ACDC Tig at around 65amps with a 1.6mm 4043 filler rod, the frame material is 6061. I also added a small gusset to the front of the break and extended it along the top tube, hopefully this will help spread the load and prevent any further failures.
Job done and customer happy, he's back on the road or maybe trail.