[WSS]

Tek,

How is the build going? I keep going back to your "obligatory" weld pic, is the lack of splatter from the pulse feature? I do not see any sticky anti spatter. I like the way the weld is equal on both up and flat, it looks like you turned it 45deg to make a "flat weld". Most of the welding we do has to be flat because of the liquid state of the spray. We spray transfer with argon and oxygen (variable) and magnetic transfer/impregnate tungsten carbide grit into the liquid puddle.

WSS

[Teknition]

Tek,

How is the build going? I keep going back to your "obligatory" weld pic, is the lack of splatter from the pulse feature? I do not see any sticky anti spatter. I like the way the weld is equal on both up and flat, it looks like you turned it 45deg to make a "flat weld". Most of the welding we do has to be flat because of the liquid state of the spray. We spray transfer with argon and oxygen (variable) and magnetic transfer/impregnate tungsten carbide grit into the liquid puddle.

WSS

The build is moving along, not quite as fast as I would like but it is progressing. I have alot of the frame done, just havent posted the pics yet. There was no anti spatter spray used when I was welding, just ground the area to be welded clean of mill scale and started welding. If you look real close you can see a tiny bit of spatter but it comes off very easily with one swipe of a putty knife. All the welds were done in the position they are pictured in, verticle welds were done verticle and flat welds were done flat.

The weld picture you are referring to is a horizontal corner weld on the end wall of the tray. I just stuck the gun in there at a 45* angle and pushed the weld along. I have a fair bit of mig welding experience but I'm a little rusty as you can see by the difference in the width of the weld ( a little fatter in the centre). I am using pulsed spray transfer which causes the nice spatter free welds. All the pulse feature does is aid in freezing the puddle in place (very nice for overhead) and also helps limit the heat input to the material. I dont think the pulse has anything to do with the welds being spatter free, its the spray transfer on clean steel that causes that. Try it on yours, grind the steel clean and leave the carbide out. Im willing to bet you will have a nice spatter free weld too. (I would imagine the carbide contamination in your weld is a cause of the majority of your spatter).

Brad

[WSS]

The build is moving along, not quite as fast as I would like but it is progressing. I have alot of the frame done, just havent posted the pics yet. There was no anti spatter spray used when I was welding, just ground the area to be welded clean of mill scale and started welding. If you look real close you can see a tiny bit of spatter but it comes off very easily with one swipe of a putty knife. All the welds were done in the position they are pictured in, verticle welds were done verticle and flat welds were done flat.

The weld picture you are referring to is a horizontal corner weld on the end wall of the tray. I just stuck the gun in there at a 45* angle and pushed the weld along. I have a fair bit of mig welding experience but I'm a little rusty as you can see by the difference in the width of the weld ( a little fatter in the centre). I am using pulsed spray transfer which causes the nice spatter free welds. All the pulse feature does is aid in freezing the puddle in place (very nice for overhead) and also helps limit the heat input to the material. I dont think the pulse has anything to do with the welds being spatter free, its the spray transfer on clean steel that causes that. Try it on yours, grind the steel clean and leave the carbide out. Im willing to bet you will have a nice spatter free weld too. (I would imagine the carbide contamination in your weld is a cause of the majority of your spatter).

Brad

Brad,

Your comment of "grind the steel clean", I am going to let that settle in! Great tip. Getting rid of the mill scale makes sense. You are correct about the clean welds. I did just that today. I carbided some curved grader blades that needed a "straightening pass" put on the opposite side to pull back true before sticking them under the press. They buckle like a spoon.

The pass had the same settings just swithched off the mag feeder. We always grind becuase of paint, most of our stuff shows up already painted. So the long and short of it is practice. I can see the advantage of the pulse there. I will just go really slow to start, practice on a bunch of scrap/drops. My table keeps getting pushed back too becuase it is getting busy again. No complaining,just wish I was further along in the commitment stage of the build then I can justify sticking to it to get it done.

How many gallons do you think your tank is?

Tommy

[Teknition]

Tommy,
I did a quick calculation of the tank and came up with 43.1 cu ft. = 322 U.S. gallons= 2690 lbs. of water.

You can burn thru mill scale with an arc welder and some 60xx series rods but mig welding likes clean surfaces. Practice make perfect and you can use a few hours a night to *practice* on your table

Brad

[WSS]

Brad,

Thanks for the help and encouragement. I managed to get the bladder/tank done with .030 70s6 using 75 argon and 25 c02. I tried .035 but felt I had to move to fast, it welded good but you could not hesitate at all. I have a Miller four roll set-up that would eat the wire at any tip stick. This got old after about ten times so I removed one set of wheels and it worked great after that. I did a soapy bubble test before presseure testing and only had oh....maybe 200 pin holes. Just kidding, there were about 8 touch ups, I did weld inside and out on everything but the lid. It is a 405g tank. I put 4psi of air in it and it held over night with a .25psi loss. WIth water it had no leaks at all. I was very suprised when I tested the output, it only took 2psi to get it to push out fast and high.

Tommy

[Teknition]

Brad,

Thanks for the help and encouragement. I managed to get the bladder/tank done with .030 70s6 using 75 argon and 25 c02. I tried .035 but felt I had to move to fast, it welded good but you could not hesitate at all. I have a Miller four roll set-up that would eat the wire at any tip stick. This got old after about ten times so I removed one set of wheels and it worked great after that. I did a soapy bubble test before presseure testing and only had oh....maybe 200 pin holes. Just kidding, there were about 8 touch ups, I did weld inside and out on everything but the lid. It is a 405g tank. I put 4psi of air in it and it held over night with a .25psi loss. WIth water it had no leaks at all. I was very suprised when I tested the output, it only took 2psi to get it to push out fast and high.

Tommy

Thar she blows!!! lol. Glad to hear you made out alright. Pushing the water out quickly is more related to volume of air rather than pressure unless you are running alot of head pressure. Did your welds turn out smooth and spatter free? My miller is a 4 drive roll machine as well. You should be able to use all 4 drives without problem, just decrease your drive roll tension. I think mine are set around #1. To set yours, engage all 4 drive rolls and back the tension adjusters to 0. Hold the gun back from a block of wood about 2 inches and squeeze the trigger. Adjust the tension up in slight increments until you can just make the wire curl without slipping in the drives.

Brad

[WSS]

Brad, I figured why the wire was crashing! I did not have the tube that goes inbetween the rolls sized right. The one that is in there is for .120 wire and let it spiral too much. I have my finger pointed to it. For some reason I lost the tubes for both the .035 and.030.....I must have ten different size sets in both knurled and v groove. But this small wire has been a learning curve for sure. The side the .030 is mounted on used to have Lincoln's NS3M in .120 on it for grouser work.

I keep looking for updates on your build, how is it going?

Tommy

[Teknition]

Glad to hear you got it figured out Tom, wire feed issues can be very irritating. That .120 is huge wire, the max I've used is .045 metal core and the deposition rate was way more than I needed at the time. Most of the stuff I weld is in the 1/4 inch range and some 1/2 or 3/4 occasionally. My build is on hold for a little bit. I just bought another pickup truck to replace my old one and have been busy putting a lift kit in it and fixing up the body on it. Should be done it in the next few weeks then I will be able to get back at the table build.

Brad

[limekyle19]

Hey Tek did you ever finish your table? or did you give up on posting pics of the build up? would really like to see the final product!

[jwolin]

I'd like to see it too! I'd also love to see you enter this design in our build log contest at cncmentor.com. Great work!

[Teknition]

I havent completed the table yet. I admit to dropping the ball on this for far too long. I have progressed a bit further than Ive documented so far. Both trays are finished and I have also made both long side frames. The next step will be to build the rails that tie the 2 long fames together. Hopefully I will have a chance around Christmas or in January to get back to my table build.

Brad

[Teknition]

I'm finally managed to make some progress on the table build :banana:

I never realized what a pain in the butt it was going to be with a single dropped rail gantry design to square up, level, plumb, and make sure both rails are parallel and on the same plane. If I was going to do this again, I would go with either both rails dropped or neither rail dropped if I couldnt afford the additional expense for the double drop.

I think the finished rail measurments are very close but trying to cross measure with any precision accuracy when one rail has a 9" height difference from the other is fairly difficult. The only way I will be sure is when the gantry goes on.

Due to a hard drive failure, I am missing some pictures of the 2 long frames being built in detail so I will describe the process and you can have a look at the finished frames for reference.

The long upper 3"x5" tube and set up on my fab bench. I measured, drilled, and tapped the top rail for the plate flanges on the 3 upright leg tubes. The flanges were then bolted to the top tube and the top tube was layed down flat on the bench. 3 upright leg tubes were then cut to the proper length, drilled, and tapped for plate flanges. Leg tubes were then tacked in place and the flanges installed for the leg cross tubes. Cross tubes were cut to length and tacked in place on the flanges. After everything was tacked in place, the final assembly was fully welded.

The following posts will have all the pictures of progress so far.

[Teknition]

more pics

[Teknition]

last pics

[Teknition]

I made a little more progress this afternoon. I removed all the upper longitudinal tubes and welded the sides and bottom. Then reinstalled the tubes. I would have just welded them in place but the bolts get in the way of the mig torch nozzle and the bottoms had to be vee'd out anyway. I also removed all 4 lower tubes on the long frames and welded in the sides of the cross tubs that I couldnt access before.

Brad

[tig-racer]

frame is looking solid

[Teknition]

frame is looking solid

Thanks tig-racer. The frame is 3x3x1/4 tube, I'm sure it will handle pretty much any plate thickness I will ever be able to put on it.

Brad

[CNCCajun]

I too will soon be building a table using PPLLC.

Probably a 4' X 6' table . . .

Just curious why you are building it as a bolt together.

And how in the world are you making all the surfaces level?

I'm sitting here trying to figure out how to do that.

Steve in Louisiana.

[Teknition]

I too will soon be building a table using PPLLC.

Probably a 4' X 6' table . . .

Just curious why you are building it as a bolt together.

And how in the world are you making all the surfaces level?

I'm sitting here trying to figure out how to do that.

Steve in Louisiana.

Hi Steve.
I'm building it as a bolt together table in case I ever have to store it and also to add adjustability to the frame. If the frame isnt exact, I will be able to shim the junctions to make it exact. Both upper tubes that the CRS gantry rails bolt to are bolted onto the rest of the frame, therefore they are easily replacable in case of damage.

As I stated earlier, making sure everything is square, level, plumb, and make sure both rails are parallel and on the same plane is quite a feat with the single dropped rail design.

To start, I took the taller longitudinal frame, and tack welded it to my fab table. Then I leveled it in both directions and finished tacking it to the table.

I then took 6 pcs of 3" tube and tack welded them together in stacks of 3 to make two 9" blocks. I tack welded the 9" blocks to the top of both ends of the shorter longitudinal frame so then the tops of both frame ends would be at the same height. Then I put the shorter fame on the fab bench and clamped them together at the top with 2 long rigid pieces of steel. Then I measured and leveled and squared and remeasured and leveled and squared while clamping and adjusting and eventually I got to a point where I believe everyting is where it should be. Then I tacked in lower cross tubes and remeasured and double checked everything. I then welded the lower cross tubes firmly in place and rechecked measurements as I went along. At that point, I removed the whole assembly and put it back on the floor. Then using the leg adjusters, I leveled the assembly on the floor and rechecked all measurements again. after that, I tacked in the upper tubes one at a time and remeasured after each weld. So the long and short of it is, measure, level, measure, level double check after each weld and if in doubt, recheck it all.

Brad

[BBchevy396_]

Looks good Tek.... Though I admit, I didn't think I'd finish mine that much sooner than you. lol

You'll love the design..... mine has made a fortune and is a tank.