magpie-man Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 I'm presently building pest control cage traps, using a Mig welder to weld the mesh and other components. I've found an affordable source good quality of stainless steel mesh in China, and am seriously considering shifting to full stainless steel construction for my traps. I'll shift to Tig welding for safety reasons, as the chromium fumes from Tig are much less than Mig. In order to keep my welding speed up I want to use an automatic cold wire feeder with the Tig welder. Wire feeders are a fairly rare species. Has anyone had experience with them? I'm also looking for a good quality Tig welder. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testament Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 http://www.tiptig-international.com/ like this kind of thing? sorry i dont have any experience but interested also, just for interests sake really. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sentra Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 buy a small second hand reco'd mig robot from england for 15knz on your doorstep. england is due to correct voltage. so cheap/robots are dead simple. it is cheaper for us to do that, than just to buying the welding supply in nz. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpie-man Posted October 30, 2014 Author Share Posted October 30, 2014 http://www.tiptig-international.com/ like this kind of thing? sorry i dont have any experience but interested also, just for interests sake really. The TiP TiG system is what alerted me to Tig wire feeding. There are two ways to go: First. Hot wire feeding, where current is feed through the incoming wire to preheat it before it hits the weld pool (created by the Tig arc). This stops the wire cooling the weld pool and increases potential weld speeds. Tip Tig is a hot wire system and adds an extra wrinkle by moving the incoming wire back and forth to agitate the weld pool and spread out the weld fillet. Second. Cold wire feeding, where the wire is fed in cold, using a feeder very similar to a Mig wire feeder. There are extra settings with a delay after Tig arc ignition before the wire starts feeding, and automatic retraction of the wire when the weld is finished. The cold wire feeders also often have pulse settings, to behave similar to hand feeding the wire. Big advantages of wire feeding is leaving one hand free to steady the torch, and an increase in welding speed – up to Mig welding rates. CK Worldwire make these cold wire feeder units: http://www.ckworldwide.com/coldwire.htm Pretty pricey however. The torch end of cold wire feeder can be mounted on the torch, or hand-held as a pendant feeder: http://www.ckworldwide.com/coldwire_hand.htm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testament Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 this is great and interesting, but to play devils advocate for a minute (like dave above) what about installing a decent suction/ventilation system to combat the fumes issue? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyingbrick Posted October 31, 2014 Share Posted October 31, 2014 That would be far cheaper, easier and faster than a tig wire feeder surely. I can see someone wasting so much time on.an auto feeder u may as well use tig and hand feed. Use thick filler wire and you won't have tonfeed as quickly by hand. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyingbrick Posted October 31, 2014 Share Posted October 31, 2014 Or stick weld? Depends on wire thickness but iv found stainless stick welding to be easier than mild steel stick welding Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
madmitsi Posted November 2, 2014 Share Posted November 2, 2014 What about stainless mig? Could get one of those air feeder helmets as well that filters the air before it goes to you Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testament Posted November 2, 2014 Share Posted November 2, 2014 Or stick weld? Depends on wire thickness but iv found stainless stick welding to be easier than mild steel stick welding wire mesh, production environment? wat? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpie-man Posted November 2, 2014 Author Share Posted November 2, 2014 What about stainless mig? Could get one of those air feeder helmets as well that filters the air before it goes to you I could run stainless wire through my existing MIG welder, but for a number of reasons I would prefer to switch to TIG. I already use a Vortex filtered air feed to a Miller helmet. It's an excellent system. Quite apart from the filtered air, the cool air flow makes it much more pleasant welding in summer, although the downside is getting your face frozen off in the middle of winter. You get used to it. The Vortex / Miller combo costs the raw end of $1200, but once you've used it for a while it's worth every penny. However it does have a couple of issues. One problem is the loudness of the fan noise travelling up the pipe into the helmet. I finally solved it (after various experiments) by cutting into the pipe and inserting a 1 litre plastic milk container. It doesn't need any internal baffling, and does a great job of soaking up the fan noise. The other problem is that the Vortex blower runs diagnostics while it's running, with an audible buzzer beeping away seemingly at random, and an internal vibrator going off (like a mobile phone, but more intense). Finally got sick of it and snipped the wires to the vibrator. The other good thing about the Miller helmet is the X-Mode setting. The helmet picks up the electromagnetic feed when the torch ignites the weld arc. X-Mode is intend for exterior use outside, where UV from the sun will otherwise trigger the helmet. However the X-Mode setting tends to trigger bit earlier when MIG welding inside, and also turns off the shading a bit more quickly. It's the standard setting I use now. Again, one of those things you won't want to be without once you have used it. Rather than deal with chrome fumes solely by using the filtered helmet, I would prefer to limit the fumes at source as much as possible. I'll be installing some sort of air removal & filtration system at some stage, but reducing the fumes at source will reduce what's needed in terms of air flow and filtration. I'd like to put up a photo of my helmet setup. How do I go about that? Can't seem to find anything in the edit menu. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpie-man Posted November 3, 2014 Author Share Posted November 3, 2014 wire mesh, production environment? wat? Yep. Production environment, with plenty of hours spent welding once every thing is set up. That's why I don't mind spending decent money on a welding system that will speed things up, as well as making welding stainless as safe as possible. The pest traps are constructed from square welded mesh with 2mm wire and 25mm x 25mm pitch. Some of the welding involves "stitching" the mesh together. Other parts of the trap have 0.8mm flat sheet components welded to the mesh. The frames of the trap, doors, and trigger mechanisms use 6mm and 4.8mm rod. A lot of components, with welds often taking less than one second each. It's also fine work, so accurate torch placement is critical. I'll put up photos of the welder setup once I've worked out how. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testament Posted November 3, 2014 Share Posted November 3, 2014 Yep. Production environment, with plenty of hours spent welding once every thing is set up. That's why I don't mind spending decent money on a welding system that will speed things up, as well as making welding stainless as safe as possible. The pest traps are constructed from square welded mesh with 2mm wire and 25mm x 25mm pitch. Some of the welding involves "stitching" the mesh together. Other parts of the trap have 0.8mm flat sheet components welded to the mesh. The frames of the trap, doors, and trigger mechanisms use 6mm and 4.8mm rod. A lot of components, with welds often taking less than one second each. It's also fine work, so accurate torch placement is critical. I'll put up photos of the welder setup once I've worked out how. yep yep, I was refering to flyingbricks post suggesting of using stick welding. i.e. crazy suggestion for your application. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyingbrick Posted November 3, 2014 Share Posted November 3, 2014 I'm sorry 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.