r/Welding • u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 • 1d ago
Critique Please Aprentice og 6 weeks here doing 6G
So I just went from 1G to 6g the 1G was close to perfekt according to my foreman, but now I am on 6g and it’s looking kinda meh, I abit of cold filler and the bottom has undercut, any help?
12
8
u/Excellent_Job8154 1d ago
Suck back on bottom, I stepped up wire size bottom 4 inches and went easy on heat , just what o did , B pipe welder here retired from that but never flunked a test , as gap tightened I would drop in wire size . Your doing real good
3
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
Thanks for the tip, love hearing from you oldies, soo much time under the hood and love for the trade
1
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
If I had to guess? Too tight of a gap, not knife edging the bevels, too cold, not enough stickout, wrong filler size or a combination of some of these.
What’s your root amperage? Your cap looks slow, it’s slow cuz it’s cold… give yourself more stickout and don’t be afraid to let her have some heat. You can root this at 120 amps with knife edges. What’s your gap? What’s your filler size? Tungsten size? S2 or s6?
Asking for help with none of this info is crazy. You should know this. Starting with the basics, that pipe is NOT clean enough. You need to clean it an inch back from the weld, inside and out. I can see in the root the contaminates it’s sucking into it.
Give us some more info so we can ACTUALLY help you, silly.
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
3mm gap, knife egde bevel, it cut me when I was flipping it over, 95 amps on the root, 120amps on cap since the procedure won’t let me go hoter, 2,4mm tungsten and 2mm filler, my tungsten’s sits close to flush whit the bevel edge, any more info
1
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
I’ve never heard of a procedure capping the max amperage at 120 on 6” carbon steel pipe. That’s crazy. You’re using a 3/32 tungsten, use 1/8th (whatever that is in mm? 3.2?) use a 3/32 (2.4mm) gap and watch the edges consume. Give it a shot and see if your root is a bit more smooth.
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
I wish I could change the gap but the procedure calls for 3,2 which is standard for my workplace
2
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
That’s fine, you can still use a bigger tungsten and up the amperage to 100-105. On your cap, since you’re limited to 120 amps, don’t use a lay wire technique… you’ll have to dab while making bigger advancements. I’d also not take any breaks… once you get that pipe hot, keep going… use it to your advantage since you can’t crank the heat up. Using laywire sucks all the heat up at that low of amperage, which is why your cup walking is so tiny.
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
Thanks I will try that tomorrow
3
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
You bet, let me know how it goes. Hopefully it makes sense. Easier to show someone than to try to explain it thru text. The beads look cold because all your amperage is going into melting the wire rather than burning into the piece (cap pass). So your “steps” as you’re walking are so close together, if you know what I mean. Imagine trying to melt a 3.2mm filler rod… you wouldn’t be able to… it would constantly just stick itself and glob over. Since you’re only allowed 120amps, you gotta use a technique that’s advantageous to you. You should be able to lay wire 2mm rod at 120amps but try walking the cup left, hold, dab. Walk it up to the right, hold, dab. Walk up to the left, hold, dab.
Just see if it works for you… focus on larger steps, so the bead looks like a zipper. Send some pics… maybe my advice changes if it isn’t working for ya. I suspect you’re probably feeding too much into the puddle but we’ll get to that if the dab method helps.
1
u/Purple_Winner4527 1d ago
Did you TIG weld the root??
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
All was done whit tig
1
u/Purple_Winner4527 1d ago
Did you have purge gas on the backside of that root pass? Doesn’t work so well when you have oxygen on one side of the weld, helps control heat too. Use to always either have the inside of the pipe purged of oxygen with a slow stream of inert gas, a backer Ring, or stick weld the root. Don’t quite understand what the weld tests are doing these days, only thing they use to let you have was a wire brush, a chipping hammer and a file.
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
Its practice for a certificate, but all has to be tig welded, and we only use purge gas on stainless and repairs
1
u/Purple_Winner4527 1d ago
Regular pipe isn’t affected by oxygen contamination huh?? News to me. Keep practicing is what I suggest, you’ll get there.
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
Its is, that’s why we get the oxside on the root but its minemmal and so the purging gass is not needed but it helps
2
u/Purple_Winner4527 1d ago
Well never have I ever been allowed to do that out in the field or in a shop on anything that was to ASME or AWS standards, oxidation and porosity are an immediate fail for anything high pressure, high carbon, pretty much the majority of pipe welding out there
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
Weird but if there porosity in the rot it’s stil a fail here, there isn’t non in the rot when I cut it open though
1
u/Purple_Winner4527 1d ago
Having a difficult time understanding what you’re saying, but good luck out there!!
1
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
If I have pores in my rot it won’t pass inspection, but when I saw the welds in half I don’t have any, even though I weld whitout purge gass
→ More replies (0)
1
u/outmememe 1d ago
Back feed the filler wire brother. Anytime I test out I always give myself a nice gap and feed the filler wire through from 3 o’clock to 9 o’clock
3
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
Backfeeding wouldn’t help him here, it would probably make the top half even worse, he’s got plenty of root reinforcement on top. It’s actually borderline too much. Plus, he’s really green. I wouldn’t recommend back feeding until he can do it from the root side first. Just my 2 cents worth. You’re not wrong… but maybe just a little too early for him.
1
u/outmememe 1d ago
He has suck back from 3 to 9. Back feeding fixes that. It ain’t that hard to do. How would it make the top half worse????
2
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
Because he’s almost at max root reinforcement. Depends what his WPS says but most places more than 1/8” at any point is a failure. Backfeeding with his current settings and skill level would ultimately make this worse. It’s a good skill for him to eventually learn, but he won’t always be in a place where he can see it, so he will need to learn both anyways.
-1
u/outmememe 1d ago
You ain’t got a clue what you are talking about chip
2
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
Love the clowns in this sub 🤡
2
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
Yes, you can always tell when someone welds and wants to help, and those who tuched a welder once and thinks it makes them a welder
2
u/Fuzzy-Finance-48 1d ago
Yessir. I don’t have a ton of pipe at the house but I can probably fixture some up and give ya some pointers thru videos if you need any extra help. I’ve done a series a videos for a some newbies that really changed their game and it’s always rewarding to see them grow and how grateful some are… others, not so much lol. Anyways, reach out to me with a PM if you’re looking for more help. I’ll do what I can.
2
u/Mountain-Vehicle-162 1d ago
That won’t be nesessary, I am an aprentice so I just post here somthiemed to get second opinion
24
u/Lower_Box3482 1d ago
The best way to make the bottom look like the top is to fuck up the top too lmao(I’m shit at pipe)