The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Wasting buch of welding wire due to bad grounding

Guys

I am welding some patch panels, For some reason I cannot get good grounding for my clamp so when I try to weld the wire gets pushed back in the welder and starts curling up and I need to cut remove the whole thing and wasted so much of welding wire. I feel wasted and I need some suggesstions on how to no do this stupid thing and waste some much of time, money and wire iteself. And more important I want to finish the welding

Any inputs are appreciated

Ganesh

Where are you attaching the ground clamp to? make sure it is clamped to clean bare metal. I usually grind off a small spot on the panel that I'm welding to, so I can clamp the ground clamp there.

As Jeff suggests clean an area on the panel you are working for your ground clamp, but also clip the end of the wire to start fresh each time you start.

One other thought. If your ground is good, then maybe you aren't running hot enough or you are running the speed to fast. Grab some scrap metal of the same gauge, ground to it, and pull the trigger. Start with the heat and then adjust the speed till your makin bacon..............Good luck

What KC means by "makin bacon" is that when the mig is set properly the weld sounds like frying bacon.

Thanks Guys, I have no problem welding on clean surface the heat, speed all is perfectly good. I have welded tons of patches but it always worked good with clean bare metal, with the path panels like kick panels, where it is big patch panel I have problems where one end I can put the ground clamp and the place where I weld is too far. Anyways I will clean enough of metal and seems like I have no other choice either. I even tried cleaning up surface of metal and tried with magnetic ground holder and still had trouble,

Ganesh

Smokey, You should be able to put the ground any distance away on the panel as long as the metal is clean. I always have chosen a good spot on the truck and used that ground point for the whole job. Seems to me there is another issue. If you still feel that the distance makes a difference why not get a small chunk of angle iron, clean it up, clamp your ground to it and then tack it to you panel as close as you want. If you tack it on one side you can break it off and move it as you progress.

well even if the ground is not good it shouldn't push the wire back up into the welder. it should push it out the gun just not arc. you may need to change the sheath inside your gun or check out the area between the rolling wheel and where the wire starts down the sheath. maybe clean the tip. what kind of welder are you running?

For what it is worth, I was having the same problem. I checked everything and couldn't figure it out. A buddy came over, and was watching me. When I struck the arc, I was dropping the stinger tip towards the work. That caused the wire to hang up on the tip, and back up the wire. You might look and see if you are doing something similar.

Hoggy

I have hobart 140 Mig, tip is all clean and new and welder seems to work fine when ground is all good. When I try to weld, my wire goes and hits the work piece when sparks doesnot happen, it bends because the roller pushes the wire and it causes wire to bend and wont messess up everything.

So let me ask this basic question in you welders, if arc doesnot come but welder wire keeps coming out, does it go back to the welder and it keep coming out and bends at the gun.

Thanks for all replies

Ganesh

well i am not a pro welder or pro anything. but everytime when my welder did that there was a problem inside. either sheath, wire wheel tension, feed wheel, or dirty tip. i had a hobart handler several years back it was a good machine, a 220 model though. i am running a miller now. still have a big hobart arc welder though.
the good thing about a mig is, if you weld a lot of rusty metal like i do, you can put the wire exactly where you want it in a clean area, then let your hood down and pull the trigger. you don't have to scratch around in the dark like with a arc welder hunting for the clean spot. you might try one of those magnetic grounding clamps. they stick right to the clean area and it doesn't have to be a edge like for a spring jaw type. i also can test my ground with the mig- if i have it grounded good it will make a very small spark with the welder running and i don't have to pull trigger. it's just enough to let me know it's a good connection. it'd very small and short, might look for it. i don't know if yours will or not.

When I've used the flux core wire, I've found that I have to clean the work area about every time I stop and start with a wire brush. Especially if I could not access the back side with the grinder. It seems that the impurities redeposit on the surface and on the tip if your wire as the weld cools. I usually have a wire brush or flapper wheel close at hand when welding patches in.

If your wire is backing up into the unit ,your wheel pressure is to tight.The first thing people do when something doesn't work right is to tighten up the wheel.
You should have just enough tension to roll the wire out,loosen the roller up then start to tighten it up until it starts to roll out your wire,if it has knurling on the wire it is to tight.

Man PapaJ I guess that is my problem, I tight the wire at the wheel too much I guess so I keeps curling up. I will try to loosen the wheel try but yesterday I had a good group and welding lots of panels like a champ

Ganesh

I got that info straight from the welding supply shop,because the guys at work were wasting alot of wire.