Acetylene Welding?

I'm a very experienced solderer. Water pipe, electronics, even production electronics, as in, there are products in peoples' hands right now, today, that have circuitboards with my hand soldering. (just don't tell them...)

Anyway, for my shop at home, over the last year, I picked up a very el cheapo wire feed, flux core welder and a torch setup. I have regulators, tips and such for both oxy-acetylene and oxy-propane.

I have stuck a few things together with the wire feed welder, but it doesn't seem to do the trick for me. It has a high setting and a low setting...nothing in between. Seems like it blows through thin stuff and just sputters a bead on top of anything thick.

In my reading about using a torch, I've read a lot about acetylene welding. It seems that the acetylene burning with a neutral flame produces its own shielding gas (CO2)...nifty.

So, one day I'm at the welding supply store, and I pick up a #6 welding tip for my torch, along with some RG45 1/16" filler rod (copper clad rod for mild steel).

With this, I've made a few repairs on thin parts...I've even used the cutting tip (with no oxygen from the trigger) and four of these little rods held together to weld some thick material. These welds are on farm equipment, and they've taken some abuse with good results.

So, I looked into getting the #15 and #30 tips for my torch and some 1/8" filler rod.

That, it seems, is equivalent to trying to buy a brand new Model T Ford. "It's a dying art." says my friend at the welding supply shop.

So...why is it dying?

I understand that acetylene welding isn't as fast as stick, MIG or TIG in a production setting. It may even use more consumables per inch of weld.

But, for me, if I can spend 100 bucks on a couple of bigger tips and get some reasonably priced filler rod of a good diameter, isn't that more cost effective than shelling out the money for a truly good MIG setup that could do the equivalent thickness (say, up to 3/8" metal, for argument's sake)?

So, are there other reasons that acetylene welding is dying? Will I never be able to make a weld that's as strong with acetylene welding vs stick, MIG or TIG?

Follow on question...why can't I use 70S2 TIG filler rod that comes in 1/8" thickness with acetylene welding. At first pass, it seems like the same application as RG45. It's a copper clad filler rod for mild steel. What gives? Something about the temperature of a TIG arc vs my acetylene flame?

The big question is, should I just give up on this fantasy of using acetylene welding to repair my farm equipment?

What you are finding is one reason to own a stick welder. I have a mig unit that is a H-F cheapo that gets used once in a blue moon but the stick welder well it sees lots of rod and many projects.

I also have a torch set up but it is used to cut or heat things and maybe braze a few things once in a while. Now days with the cost of Acetylene being what it is a stick welder is far cheaper t use the a torch

My wife would agree with you, because part of the reason I've resisted a good, heavy stick welder is that I'd have to put it in a fixed place in the garage with a 220 outlet. That would mean that I'd have to keep the garage organized, clean enough to always be able to get my work close to the welder.

The torch? I can just move a few things around and wheel it to wherever I need to go...

I can't talk her into the generator/welder setup that would give me the same portability, but I'm working on it.

My old Lincoln buzz box sits about 3 foot odd the ground on a mount I made in the middle of my shop. It has 100 foot leads on it so I do not have to move it. I also have a portable one but it is pull start so a pain in the back sides to use

Great point. Longer, better quality cables are more cost effective and less chance for problems than a generator...and if I ever got in a real pinch, once or twice in my lifetime, where I absolutely HAD to go out to the field, I could borrow a generator or just pay a real welder with a truck setup to do that one particular fix for me.

Even my portable welder has 100 foot leads on it. I used the portable one to build my hay barn and my shop and both have welds that are 20 plus feet in the air so had to have long leads to do those buildings

Some folks around here put their arc welder on wheels and make up a 240 volt extension cord. It works fairly well. 50 feet or so of power cord and 50 feet of welding lead, is what one guy has.

Garry

I use coat hangers for rods. Never bought anything but brazing rods for the torch. Acetylene welding is expensive compared to stick.

Oxy/acet is not dying . A set of tanks will always be needed on a job site. Gas bottles are going out the door every day in the supplier near me. On some jobs [ like press jobs] there is no way to generate enough heat without oxy/acet. If I look at metal fist I think can I arc weld it next can I MIG it then gas. Gas more for a heat source and brazing jobs, TIG for the intricate little stuff.

You sort of bring up why I was thinking along the lines of trying to do more with my oxygen/acetylene kit in the first place.

For instance, to do MIG, I need another welder, more tanks of gas (Argon?), etc, etc

To do Stick, I need another welder.

I already have oxygen and acetylene around, because of the torch. I'm already refilling those tanks here and there, because of the cutting that I'm doing.

If I could have gotten the welding tips for my torch at a reasonable price and some decent filler rod, it seemed like a good path to think about, but like the responses show, it's not so cut and dried.

I'm spending some time on craigslist to see if any good 220V stick rigs come up. I don't need anything right now, so maybe patience can save me some money.

My torch gets used for heating up rusted old tractor parts, brazing and cutting. You just get too much warpage when welding with one.
Get yourself a name brand mig that uses gas and you will like it ! I first bought an elcheapo off brand used and had nothing but trouble. I think it originally came from a welding supplier I went back to ask them about it and he showed me the difference. I walked out of there with a brand new Lincoln SP100 which had just came out back then. Been happy with it ever since. Now I only wish I'd of paid more and got a bigger 220 volt machine to do thicker metals.

> So...why is it dying?

Gas welding has been on the decline since the introduction of arc welding over a century ago. And the availability of reasonably priced TIG welders has accelerated that decline.

Gas welding is my preferred process for light stuff; you can get a nice, flat weld in steel and aluminum that you won't get with other processes. But it's fairly impractical for heavy welding unless it's the only equipment you have. Note that the really large tips required for welding heavy steel also require a large acetylene tank so you don't exceed the safe draw-down rate.

As for your cheapie wire-feed welder, you need to understand that the "Hi-Lo" switch controls VOLTAGE, but the Wire Speed knob is what controls CURRENT. If it's not hot enough to penetrate heavy material, crank the speed up. If it's too hot for thin stuff, slow it down. Once you have the speed right, you can switch the voltage to reduce spattering (voltage too high) or stop electrode sticking (voltage too low).

garry, heres my portable dc welder, 260 amp on a farmall m. runs off the belt pulley. handier than pockets on a shirt

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Hi dr sportster

Oxy /acet as a heat or cutting source for some jobs is not dying its the guys that know how to braze and gas weld that are. I was looking to replace our newer hoses/ regulators that are getting worn out again, and the original cutting torch/ heating tip combo dad brought in about 1967 or so in England.
I talked to the guy in the welders supply when I picked up $200+ of gasses. he said I got a kit with everything including hoses regs, a cutting tip and one heat tip. and you need to buy a rose bud. I asked about the different sized nozzles for brazing and fine work. He looked at me said that will cost about $900 for a full set we don't have them nobody knows how to gas weld or braze anymore, they don't even teach it in local tech school now!. I told him I'm 42 and learned it and still braze. He about died as I could do it at my as he put it younger age.!.


With the crazy price of gasses now and what i use in a year. if I could use a plasma cutter for more of what I do here, and could get enough heat with propane for most heating/cutting jobs and quit brazing. I'd drop the acet run propane for fuel and buy a plasma cutter for fab work. the plasma would pay for it's self on gas savings.
Our local scrap yard is paying finance on 2 track machines with shears on, by hardly using the cutting torches to process metal and what they save a year on cutting gas .

We used acetylene at work when foreign tube fittings were cut and soldered to our fittings. Hal

I had a el-cheapo 110V 80 Amp flux wire welder that I finally gave to a co-worker's young daughter.
Told her NOT to expect much from it. Gave her a HF auto dark helmet too.

I bought a Hobart 140 as I only have 110V in my garage. It will run flux or gas.
Since I do most of my welding outside I leave the flux wire in it.
For what I do I am more than pleased with it. I have built a few things with it including a new bucket with 10G to 3/8" steel.
According to the manual it's for up to 1/4" but with proper prep the 3/8" was no biggie.

If I had done just a little more research I would have bought the dual voltage unit instead in case I ever get 220V into garage.

I do need to get to a friend's place to pick up a Lincoln wire welder that he used for his street rod projects.
He passed away 12 years ago and she wants it gone.
That will be the indoor welder as it has a bottle on it.
Of course when the bottle is empty I will have to bite the bullet on a new bottle as that one is probably over 15 years old.

Got the FIL's Harris torches but when empty I have to get new for them too. One has a test date of over 25 yrs ago ~sigh~

I graduated high school in 1995 and I took autobody for the last two years of high school. They actually was still teaching gas welding. The real fun is when they make you weld two pieces of sheet metal together with no filler rod. It takes practice but can be done. Now if you ever had to fill and sand a quarter panel thT has been gas welded in a car you would see exactly why electric welded replaced gas welding. They warp horribly when welded with gas because of so much heat transfer. I honestly thought many times they would have been better off to have left the original mashed up quarter panel in the car and repaired it instead. Both require the same amount of body filler...lol