Lug,
One thing that makes tig a little easier is substituting gas lenses in place of the ceramic cups. I especially noticed the difference when welding aluminum. Another thing that really helped me was taking a welding class at a local community college. I had learned tig about 40 years prior but then didn't do any because I didn't have a tig machine until recently. The instructor let me skip all the other class materials and go straight to tig.
