FYI: Some welding tips Car related, Feel free to add yours Options

[rick 918-S]

Lots of you guys will know this stuff but some may find it helpful. Here are a couple of photos of a Mercedes I'm working on for a friend. This car was butched back in the 70's. I'm trying to put it back together. All the spot weld flanges are damaged with brazing. The brass needs to be removed and replaced with steel so I can spot weld the car back together.

Some of the flanges are good for the most part, So I'm not cutting them off completely and making new ones. Were I can, I use a piece of copper and simply run a couple beads of weld across the copper and then grind/file the weld back to the thickness of the metal.

Your wire feed will actually arc on the copper. So you can even start your arc just off the edge of the metal your repairing and then move into the damaged edge.

This also works good for a backer on small holes. The copper will pull some of the heat out of the weld causing a rapid cooling effect.

A simple source for copper flatbar is soft copper tubing. If you've done any home plumbing repair you probably have a piece of copper tubing under the work bench. Just hammer it flat and your in business.

[r_towle]

So,
on butt welds that will show, yet you cannot reach around to hold the copper with a clamp...I was thinking.

Can I magnet the copper on there, magnet to magnet...copper and metal in the middle.

Also, I have been using 18 gauge copper...is that thick enough?
Its not really making life easier...so I thought maybe its either not thick enough, or not firmly attached...

Rich

[rick 918-S]

So,
on butt welds that will show, yet you cannot reach around to hold the copper with a clamp...I was thinking.

Can I magnet the copper on there, magnet to magnet...copper and metal in the middle.

Also, I have been using 18 gauge copper...is that thick enough?
Its not really making life easier...so I thought maybe its either not thick enough, or not firmly attached...

Rich

Rich, I like 3/4 " copper tubing. I just cut a length off what ever I think I'll need, hammer it out flat. I would say it's at least 40 ga. because it's double thick. It's rigid enough to clamp and soft enough to trim with a tin snip if you need to notch it out around something.
I would think your 18 ga would try to distort as it pulls the heat way. This would open a gap and allow the metal to drop away. Just a guess.

I've never tried magnets. They would have to be powerful.

You could always use a couple of kleco's or 1/8" sheet metal screws to hold the copper backer in place. Then all you would have left is a couple plug welds when the seam was finished.
You could run the kleco's or sheet metal screws down the seam through the copper backer.

There's some good ideas here, specially scotty b! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wacko.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/happy11.gif)
Keep them coming! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/welder.gif)