Brass mig!

At work I've just discovered that we have a mig the welds brass, wow! Then I asked my boss how much he paid, he replied $3000. Wow! They seem like a brilliant idea, you can weld panel steel longer than a normal mig cause it's a lot cooler. It wouldn't rust on the other side where in some cased primer/paint cannot get at. Super easy to grind cause it's so soft.

Apart from the price why aren't these more commonly used? Obviously there not ment for anything structural, but if your doing a chop, section or heaps of rust repair I think there well worth it.

What's everyones thoughts and experience with them?

 

Let us know how to get plastic and paint to stick to it. Bob

 

I think I'll stick to my regular mig. I guess yo could use it to fill holes if you don't mind your bodywork failing after a while, I'd never use it for a chop or patch panel.

 

I will see what others have to say about brass.


my own opinion is that I take it all off of any car I care about, because paints and fillers don't seem to stick to it very well, and it seems to grind harder than a gas weld with steel rod.

 

I THINK you may be refering to silicone Bronze. There was a discussion on the Incredible Welds thread a few weeks ago. It is used by some car manuf. for high strength metal is stess areas, because it's a cooler weld, don't warp or stress the steel as much. Volvo is one of the manuf. I know, found out recently about it when some friends were repairing one. You must use straight argon to mig it.

 

Bog or as you guys say bondo sticks to it just fine. They have been using it at work (panel beating) for years with not one complaint or problems with bog falling out.

As far as grinding, it's by far the easiest thing I've ever ground.

 

This one is going to show my age again. I'm sitting here and reading about folks saying filler and primer won't stick to brass, and I'm thinking, "WTF"? We never worried about that when I worked for Fisher Body @ Lakewood GM ATL, '58-'66. Then I remembered, we didn't use any plastic filler, just lead when absolutely necessary.
Never had any problem with primer sticking on top of brass either, and in those days there were several joints that were brazed in every car. Course with the "bonderite" process, which was a bath in a caustic solution, then a neutralizing flush , that primer stuck every where.
Never tried MIG on steel with brass filler, interesting. Does the machine reverse polarity, or go to AC for the process?
I know in the past I had a boat prop shop and I had to often build up the leading edge of the blades with filler matching parentmetal.
On "Nibral" (alloy of nickel, bronze, and aluminum) props with a TIG I found it seemed to help if I welded with AC similar to aluminum, seemed to clean the surface better as the arc flashed across the edge.
This makes me wonder about using a TIG and brass or silicon bronze rods.

 

its actually called a bronze silicate welder...but the terms people are using interchange...i sell them...they are used on high end stuff..BMWs Mercedes etc..I jusyt sold one to a local BMW store so they could be in the certified program..

We sell them and they are 20 grand...i know no one will believe it but you can weld an aluminum can to a razor blade..our technical guy can do so much amazing things with it..he can make aluminum stick to steel etc..its an inverter type welder..and the control settings are hight tech..its the future for modern cars..and who know where they are going..its amazing technology...and way OT...but pretty cool...the inverter alows you to have so much control you can do fusion or adheasion welding...or it can weld or you can make different metals stick..

what makes primer and plastic filler fall off of brass is not the brass..its the flux..ya get the flux off, use some epoxy primer and it will never peel..ive got cars i brazed patches in 25 years ago..and youd never know there was brass there, unless you ground it down..

 

Might work good on cast iron also.

 

I've used silicon bronze rod with my tig welder with great success--pure argon.

 

I've used it since the late eighties for repairing cast iron blocks and heads. Works great in my old Linde mig.

 

Might it be worth retitling and editing this post to reflect that it is about Silicon bronze and not brass?

 

Tin the area like you would for lead and it cures that problem.