If your not a welder, know your limitations!

I know it has been said before, but safety can't be stressed enough. I know that being on a tight budget really hurts things, especially when building toys. Having a welder and maybe doing mediocre work on patch panels is fine....I get it. However, when building a chassis, that is not something to "hope" is good enough. I went to give an estimate on a 34 Ford Roadster today, that a guy built entirely by himself. When he called me yesterday he said he hit a huge pothole and it sheared the front perch mount from the frame rail and was barely hanging on. Had to have it towed home on a flatbed. When I looked at it today, the chassis was not structurally sound to begin with, and the welds were a globbed mess of wtf. This guy is extremely lucky he didn't kill himself, due to the fact the horns were broken off perch mount and on the ground. The scary part is my wife and children share the road with these cars. If you are going to do it all yourself, for the love of God, at very least have someone that knows what their doing guide you through it. Never skimp on shit that can kill you, period. End rant.

-DMFB

 

well said... too many of those cars out there. and most of them are ---rods...

 

Well said.
Is it true that you Masons secretly rule the world?

 

Ok.

 

We used to man, but now we're too busy gathering goats for meetings, and fixing chassis people screw up.

 

Sounds like he used a 110 mig or a 130 mig ,To weld with.I like arc for frame work.After I saw my buddies car take a spin from a broken wels Ill stick to the arc welder not a 110 to 130 machine....

 

Was there a lot of Bondo over the welds?

 

It was a 110 welder, and thin walled tubing for the rails. The rails were left uncapped, and the perch mount was only welded (kinda, lol) to the outside. The whole thing was sketchy. I like to tig them, but I have a 220 Mig that does the job fine too.

 

lol, no. There were a lot of welds over the welds though.

 

Yep, seen some goofy stuff.
Last week I had a 48' semi trailer in for some crossmembers that hold the rear axles. There was at least two prior atremps to patch it. Both failed, welds looked like bubble gum and birdshit. Actually if they had fixed it with bubble gum and birdshit it would have held better. That work was done by a professional trailer shop.

 

Montcalm , WV , 24747
Bailey Lodge #137

Just wanted to say hi to a brother....and , btw , who ever said that the goat was unwilling at meetings?

 

Well said, couldn't agree more!

 

I thought thats how you test a weld, by driving it down the road.

 

Nice to meet you brother, and I never said any such thing, lol. Now I am curious how many brothers are in here.....hmmm.

 

I hear ya, we had a local yocal that welded his 8" rear end in using 9" brackets with a mig welder turned wide open. It broke off when he tried a holeshot in front of his house with his grand daughter and him strapped in harnesses in the Model A. the rear end almost made it out from under the car, it was hanging by one shock mount. The fuel tank was ruptured and the av. gas was pouring out on the ground...he was lucky. I built my own frame and had it tacked together, I could have migged it myself, I had done production mig welding for about ten years and had access to several big migs.. My brother was a weldor at a big fab shop where he had been arc welding things like highway overpass beams for decades. I let him weld it and now I have no worries. I have seen too many scarey welds on cars, somebodys gonna get killed...again.

 

yep, just because you can stick two pieces of metal together does not mean that is is structurally strong or correct. ever wonder why true welders, fabricators are so good? lots of skill, training, testing and practice welding over'n'over till ya get everything dialed in. too often when we only do welding now and then, like painting, we expect it to be perfect. when ya read an article that states hundreds, if not thousands, of hours go into building a car they are not kidding. nothing is easy, except screwing things up and possibly hurting yourself or others. one of the things that you see on reality build TV shows is "blink" welding - not using any true protection for eyes or face - just blink as the weld is going and open your eyes to check what you just did. not afraid to admit that only do basic tacks, small brackets, etc. leave the important welding to someone with true skills until truly ready and have the correct quality equipment..

 

I think you meant to say stick instead of arc, right? Because in my book, stick, MIG and TIG all use an arc to weld, including the 110 and 130 boxes you mentioned.

 

Sounds as though it was pretty much just tack-welded, waiting for the knowledgeable welder to finish it off right. People who work at muffler shops out of high school need not kid themselves. Stick to pipes that aren't chassis structural. For heavy and critical chassis work, you need to (1) design and fit the chassis parts closely first, then (2) get a good deep weld. This is why trailer-hitch places preach against welding. Too many amateurs who flatter themselves that they are welders. My dad welded for a living (rr, mass-transit, industrial, ect.) and trained many a good welder (those who didn't wash out of training). He said, "There are WELDERS, and there are DAUBERS." Check out what 37Kid said.

And before somebody thinks they'll flame me, I knew a good man who trusted his '35 Chevy to a "welder." When he was done rolling after a break on the interstate, they put him in the ground.

DMFB is right. If you want to be a structural welder, get trained to do it right and use the right equipment so you can sleep at night. People and their loved ones ride on the integrity of your work.

 

You forgot to mention baking cakes for the monthly meetings bake sale...



.

 

I agree. I can stick 2 pieces of metal together, but I don't call it welding... I'm building a T-bucket so, I bought my frame from Ron Pope @ RPM. I'm smart enough to not trust my poor skills. Safety First!! And Mr. Holbrook, my shop teacher, thought that I didn't learn anything.

 

What amazes me is how many people I see that do no prep work. They don't clean up the areas first, and a chamfer......forget about it. Prep work is 80% of welding I would say, but too many people are too excited to grab the gun and throw salt to it. There is also a lot of guessing on penetration......this isn't highschool.....just the tip doesn't count. haha. I still grab scrap metal and do a test to make sure everything is dialed in and the penetration is right. I will never doubt something that rolls out of my shop. If I raise an eyebrow, it gets redone. Plain and simple.

 

Well, I heard you, Ebb. This (safety) ain't no joking matter. 'Rods are built from the ground up. So the frame/chassis has to be reliable. I've seen factory welds on Detroit cars in the junkyards that wouldn't have gotten by our inspectors at Buckeye Steel Castings in Columbus. Joints that only had maybe three heavy welds? This is how they put a chassis together? The inspectors would have turned away and left the matter to the supervisor. A job like that wouldn't even get to go to the Testing Department guys. And if they found a spec of slag in there, they'd send the assembly back to have that weld burned out and welded back up right.

 

Another issue is all the cheap welding equipment you can buy these days, there is no way a Harbor Freight POS works as well as a real piece of welding equipment.

 

Now you're giving away too much information!

 

Yup, DMFB. I like nothing better than to see a proper joint weld that looks -- as the old guys say -- "just liked a clean row of dimes" ! If I see somebody weld like that, then I'd trust it, maybe even without a sonic or other test.

 

Amen to that. I'm certified in stick welding: flat, horizontal, and vertical. My training was to learn how to weld 48" pipe. I still question the strength of my welds, after being certified. There are a lot of crappy welded frames/suspensions running around. I've seen arrogant wanna be fabricators put their life on the line with their limited skills in welding. All to save a buck? Truly is scary.

 

You guys stay on topic!

(AND, stay away from my Daisy!)

 

Like Hobart, Lincoln? Do they still make those in the U.S., or did China buy them too?

 

hey man, this is the HAMB. You know the rules...Pictures or it never happened.

 

If it did, Miller, Hobart, Lincoln etc, would be out of business. I feel the same for everyday used item such as sockets/ratchets etc. You get what you pay for....typically. Don't get me wrong I have tons of Craftsman tools, even some Kobalt tools, but typicall those don't hold up nearly as well as the things I have that are snap on, cornwell, or mac. Tommy Boy said it best.....I can sh%t in a box and mark it guaranteed, but all you really have is a guaranteed piece of sh%t.