Edmondo arriva a casa nostra! Edmondo the doka comes to our house!

Turn the speed down then. Get some scrap, one hand on speed control.
Turn it down until the wire starts to burn up towards the tip (too slow).
Turn it up until it bounces off the work (too fast).
What you want is just fast enough not to burn back, though anywhere from here to where it bounces will produce a good weld.
The slower you can cope with, the flatter the weld and less grinding, but easier to make holes, so head for back a bit from bouncing perhaps.

 

I'm ignoring you saying it's ok.
If you were nearer I'd nip round and set up your welder. I never change wire speed on mine unless welding completely upside down when I turn it up very slightly. The same speed setting works for all power settings so never needs moving.

 

Forgot to add, don't close your eyes as you pull the trigger

 

Aye, keep going, you'll only get better with practice. What Silver said earlier about avoiding welding in hard to get at areas until you're on a roll is good advice.

 

All good advice there Malc, practice makes perfect an all that, when I started and was playing with off cuts of metal, i knew i'd pretty much cracked it when two things happened,
1 the welds looked similar after i'd welded 2 pieces together and flipped the piece over for a look at the back ( I say similar because it looked more 'melty' on the back)
and coincidentally 2. that frying bacon sound that i'd heard so much about but thought was a myth happened.

I found the problem with tall welds was that if I was grinding them back to flush they would appear strong until they were ground down. Whilst grinding, the welds would turn blue and then with a little more grinding i'd pretty much end up with two pieces of metal again. But crack on it is good fun innit

 

I like the self darkening helmets, but I still nod my head just before I pull the trigger

 

The auto darkening helmet will help malc
When you can hold the torch with two hands and you can see what your doing its a big help

Slow down a bit even if you do an inch and walk away from it for 1o mins and as steve said knock your wire speed down
Whilst your learning dont try and do one long weld
Do a blob untill it starts to flow then let go of the trigger move right next to the first blob just before it cools put your next blob to it untill it starts to flow again

For the work you have done allready buy one of these and some good quality belts of ebay( ill get you a link from where i get mine from in a bit)

http://www.tooled-up.com/product/bl...oductlisting&gclid=CIf94eS1t8ICFUoCwwodBF4AOg

Take the weld back with the finger file
Then use a very thin cutting disc to put a very slight groove in the remaining weld

Then with a slower wire speed and a decent amount of power weld into the groove using the method i said above

Mig welding may seem like black magic but its not
Its one of those things that really knocks your confidence when you start but at one point it just starts to happen right

I really struggled at first with thin panels so i spent a day with some thick angle iron just welding bits to another bit
Its a lot more forgiving on the thick steel and you will get the hang of getting it to flow
Then move onto thinner sheet steel with less power

I am so glad you posted your pics because i was of the impression that the late bay wasent about ridicule and more about helping and advising
Each other to help keep these old dubs on the road

 

Maybe the longest post without moaning waffle

 

You dont waffle you see a circumstance on the forum where some story or discussion will either lighten the mood or pull people together

I did moan a lot but it was because i was using the forum as an outlet and a sounding board during dark times

 

W

Well as long as its not a blue waffle carry on