How to Plug Weld Auto Body Sheet Metal & Prevent Pinch Weld Rust

sometimes you have to pinch two pieces of metal together and weld them in order to accomplish that we use something called a plug weld and so all we have to do is take a MIG welder and fill or plug that hole and that will follow those two together these are typically a weld like this is found on pinch welds on the bottom of rockers wheel wells truck beds and so on so let me get the welder set up and I'll be right back so the first step is to make sure that the material is really clean and you can either sandblast wire brush or grind the area clean the next step is to set up your welder I'm using a Miller Matic 91 10 and I have it set on 2 right now but if that's if it burns through then I'll back it off to one so let's go ahead and we're gonna clamp these together make sure they're nice and tight and then we're just gonna we're gonna go in a circle and it doesn't always turn out perfect and if it doesn't all you have to do is grind it flat sandblasted and Phillip so don't worry if it doesn't turn out absolutely perfect but the idea is to go around in a circle and fill them so let's go for it [Music] so now you can hold the welder like this above the work and then just go in a circle like that and and try your best to fill it now the key is you know you want to keep the line straight so the wire feeds through there real well we're just going to we're just going to go in a circle like that [Music] now I did hear a little bit of a pop and it should sound like you're frying bacon and this this one turned out pretty well so let's move to the next one and I'll show you the back side so you can see how it penetrated now it was popping a little bit and I probably should go over there and turn the wire feet down just a little bit well we're just gonna go for it so again we're just gonna go in a circle nice circle [Music] and that's that for that one and now sometimes a wire can get all godly and and gunked-up and you want to make sure that the inside of this is clean you knock it out and they do have some putter type stuff that you can stick stick that in right here and clean that out it you stick it in there and then it cleans it or keeps it clean doesn't really clean it but make sure that's clean and your wire is clipped nice so let's clamp this one off make sure it's nice and tight and again we're just going to go in a circle and that's that so let me show you the backside I'll shut the welder off we'll get this on clamped and I'll show you the backside so you can see how how well it penetrated so I unclamped it and I bent it up into something that may resemble something on a vehicle this is the front side and this is the back side so you can see it got good penetration there now somebody mentioned how you could prevent this from rusting these pinch this type of weld this this type of pinch weld and I have had very good luck preventing pinch welds from rusting bottoms of doors tailgates trunk deck lids hoods anywhere where there's a pinch weld I've had very unbelievably good luck by taking used motor oil and maybe if you can't exactly get it in there like that you can drill holes somewhere in order to get oil let me remove this blanket in order to get oil down in there so I just take and I squirt it like that and that oil is just gonna seep seep seep in there and look at that it's even coming out of a tiny little orifice in that weld so that's gonna really protect the inside of that pinch weld the the sandwiched part of that pinch weld otherwise salt and water will get in between these two pieces of metal and eventually this will rust out so that's what I do to prevent these plug welds or pinch welds from rusting finally one last tip that might help you out is I picked up instead of using a wire brush I picked this up from Harbor Freight and I'm very impressed with it it has impregnated grit inside of that wheel and you can clean you clean a lie cleaned up a pickup truck bed with this and it really worked well so we're just going to clean up the weld so you can see what they look like [Music] and that's it so I hope you enjoyed this video on plug welds and what I do to prevent plug welds or pinch welds or sandwiching of metal from rusting out and if you did and you would like to see other videos and and or my latest video don't forget to hit the subscribe button

Channel: Lakeside Autobody

Views: 83,479

Rating: 4.8612366 out of 5

Keywords: How-To, Plug Weld, Auto Body, Sheet Metal, How to Plug Weld Auto Body Sheet Metal, Prevent Pinch Weld Rust, plug welding, spot welding, how to plug weld holes, how to fill holes welding, automotive welding, wire feed welding, rust prevention, lakeside autobody, Steckschweißen von Blechen, soldadura por enchufe

Id: 388I5kqKlgo

Length: 7min 20sec (440 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 11 2019