TIG Aluminum Setup and Settings

alright let's top cups the majority of people weld in the aluminium use a standard number 5 like this and for thicker stuff let's switch up to number 7 the reason they use a standard is it seems like it controls or stabilizes your arc better so you get a real tight arc so you can get a tight bead with this when you're in like a Filat weld compared to using a gas lens guess lens your arc is almost wider so it's melting point is wider and so you'll get like a wider bead profile I like using a gas lens with a number 7 cup on it it just makes a way nicer bead to me the only thing is you got to learn how to control it and every once in a while for some reason it'll wander even more than usual and then I'll switch to a standard and then switch back and see if my machine is acting better now for me I have two real tungsten choices that I use I use lanten aided either 2 percent or one and a half percent and love porn sent me these these are multi mix the pink tungsten and these pretty good they they last a lot higher current than lanthanide but they don't have as positive as a strike so like when you light up you really got a scratch it to get it going and but they do last a long time also if you're trying to ball them up it's kind of a pain in the butt to get it just right lanthorn ated is a lot easier you can also use Siri aided the problem that I have with Siri ated is that it'll start cracking on you over time and then you'll start getting a wonky arc on it so I usually use either lanthanide at 2% or one and a half percent and I've been using this pink stuff and I do like it but for beginners probably that lanten ated so on this machine it's got AC and DC current right here and right now it's set to DC so that's for your regular steels and if you're gonna be welding aluminum switch it over to AC like that if you have a sync relay or something similar a lot of times they'll have a handle right in the center and you turn it up to the squiggly line and that's your AC so on this one this is your main current so your main amps I usually max out whatever I can to the thickness of the tungsten so I'm using 332 and that's usually good to around 210 to 220 220 amps and then this is for pulse only not going to be using pulse so leave that off all right AC frequency if you have an inverter with and it's capable to adjust this I usually leave it between 60 and 120 that's the good range that I've found basically it's the less amount of frequency you have the lower frequency the wider your arc and the less control you have over it so it's gonna be like a wide bead and kind of dancing around but it will give you more heat that way and then the higher you go on your frequency the tighter your bead is but the more annoying it is so if you need intricate stuff turn it up if you need regular like outside corners or just whatever down around 60 and then cast usually way down here just so I can get some more heat so AC balance I usually have it around 35% on this machine it changes to the material that you're welding a lot of times if it's like super super clean you might be able to get away with 20% but I doubt it it'll probably be more like 30 but all I do is I start welding and see how it's reacting and when I'm done I'll look at that cleaning line also get the white edge on the sides and if it's touching that puddle you need to up your balance so some machines are backwards from this one you know it might say 100 percent over here vice versa and the way that you figure it out is you turn it all the way one way step on the pedal and then spin it the other way step on your pedal and the way that your tungsten balls up or disintegrates that's your positive side so this would be my positive side over here this the negative and if you have like a sink relieve they have an AC balance it's called dig on there but you should leave it around six or seven if you have it on that because you can use it to ball your tungsten that's what I do at work but it uses some weird way of doing the AC balance so if you're over seven if you're like around nine it really messes with your puddle and you get these really high bridge sides with a deep in cave on them and it just it's not a very nice weld so if you're having that problem that might be it I leave it on six sometimes seven if I need like an extra ten amps but I don't want to tungsten up but yeah leave it near the middle on those machines on your regular transformer ones because it really messes with your puddle once you go above that and the way that I go about finding my preferred cleaning number is I'll set it on one and weld and I'll look at that cleaning action and if the white line is dipping in and out of that puddle you need more cleaning and if it's super wide you don't really need that much cleaning but if you like it leave it now if you've ever had trouble putting your tungsten in there it's like really tough what you can do is tighten this back cap all the way down and then loosen it just barely and that'll give it enough room to slide in there because sometimes if your collets messed up it won't let it in there because that call it's gonna be like jacked up to one side or down so if you tighten it and then loosen it just barely it'll give it enough room the slide in there alright gas flow rate now with the aluminum you don't need very much gas flow so I'm running number six so I should be on about 12 if you double the size of the cup that gives you a really good range for your CF H with a number 5 standard you can be down around 10 this one's a little lower than what it actually says so I'm probably around 10 to 12 right here you just kind of got a feel it out and see what works if you're not getting good gas coverage then turn it up just a little bit but try and keep it real low and aluminum loves them alright filler rod choice just real quick so what I like to do if I'm running 53 56 like this I like to tungsten match so if I'm running 332 tungsten I'm gonna be running 332 filler run but if I'm running 40 43 I'll size up so I'm running 332 tungsten I'm gonna run an eighth inch filler and that seems to work really well for me if it's something smaller and you only need a sixteenth inch tungsten band a 16 inch filler or 5356 of work fine and a 3/32 filler for 40 43 will work fine and that's the best way that I've found for that occasionally all around 8 inch 53 56 with 332 but that's usually if it's like a quarter-inch thick piece of material and I really need to get some filler material in there [Music] you super dirty look at the edge line see how it's eating the puddle basically and on the top side it's non-existent now it needs to go up [Music] you can see it's still doing about the same thing it's a little cleaner but as I'm welding I can see a lot of crud flowing into the puddle a little better you can see starting to get shinier but there's still a bunch of crud flowing into the puddle about the same as the last I mean turn it up a little more and still Plus as fans wanting to go into the puddle so I guess this Thompson probably won't last [Music] there we go see how shiny that one is compared to the other ones that's what I like now I could probably run 30% on here if I clean this material but it's just messing around at home I'm not going to clean it so this was that first one you can see it like almost had no cleaning action through here and you can see it slowly get better until we have this this is what I like this is a nice clean puddle it might be more of a nitch zone but I would way rather have it nice clean and shiny like this then even grayed out like this or like that when I pull up my tungsten I like to sharpen it like that have it just real a real sharp tip or steep tip and then I blunt off the end when I run it up against the sander and then what I do is I hold dead center above just a thick piece of aluminum and then I'll just I have it turned all the way on the to the positive side so it'll melt that tungsten and I just worked the foot pedal I kind of bump it back and forth until I get the ball that I like I want it to wrap around that whole tip and basically be flush on all sides everyone likes it differently I've seen people sharpen their tungsten real long like they would for steel and then the ball it up to where it just got a itty bitty ball on it and that's good for inverters and this is if you don't want a sharp tip like I I'm partial to the ball because I've been doing it for so long on a transformer machine so this is what I like to do [Applause] [Music] and that's about the tip that I like just a real nice ball even on the way around and this also helps so that if instead of letting it ball as you're welding that'll have it sometimes tip down towards gravity or sometimes a like if using that pink try mix our multi mixed stuff from well or if you let it ball how it will it'll get these nodules on the end that kind of shoot off in all directions if you don't ball it like this [Music]

Channel: 5th Street Fab

Views: 345,745

Keywords: HTP, HTP pro, HTP pro pulse, HTP pro pulse 200, HTP pp200, tig welding, welding aluminum, aluminum welding, tig welding aluminum, how to set up aluminum tig welder, how to set up tig for aluminum, how to set up my tig welder for aluminum, aluminum tig settings, welding aluminum tig settings, tig setup for aluminum, tig welding setup for aluminum, tig welder setup for aluminium, tig welding settings for aluminum, settings for aluminum tig welding, tig settings for aluminum

Id: FCGrSpdNdLA

Length: 13min 48sec (828 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 31 2018