Beginner: Welding

Just a little tip from a panel beater friend......where possible avoid right angled corners; round them or diagonal cut the corner. There is less likely to be buckling or distortion.

make Shure to paint or fish oil insides of your new weld patches asap to seal them or else they will start to rust again , you may have to drill access holes to get into cavity's, I use a kero gun with a plastic pipe fitted to drench hard to get spots with fish oil ,

cheers damo

:)good advice thanks for that ,,,,,I will get behind the doors ,there is access ,& hit it with fish oil.... :-*

Just a little tip from a panel beater friend......where possible avoid right angled corners; round them or diagonal cut the corner. There is less likely to be buckling or distortion.

I watched a welder doing that ,thanks for the advice..

For all those that like to have a go at panel repairs a Flange and punch tool is real handy.
It puts a nice lip on the metal and really reduces the buckling from welding
About $100 to buy, air operated.

For all those that like to have a go at panel repairs a Flange and punch tool is real handy.
It puts a nice lip on the metal and really reduces the buckling from welding
About $100 to buy, air operated.

Amen to that. Produces a neater, near-flush repair.

Jarrod.

Keep practising it will come, I have found this link handy. www.mig-welding.co.uk/

Graham

For all those that like to have a go at panel repairs a Flange and punch tool is real handy.
It puts a nice lip on the metal and really reduces the buckling from welding
About $100 to buy, air operated.

Amen to that. Produces a neater, near-flush repair.

Jarrod.

Blackduck and Jarrod - after creating the lip with the flange tool, do you guys punch holes and MIG the holes to fix the panel or do you fully weld the patch panel? And if the rear was visible (say in a truck cab) would you weld the rear as well? Cheers - Bugly

Bugly, I don't have the skills to do "nice" welding, but I will make it flush on the side which will be visible and weld it all around if I can. (and then lots of grinding ) You will always see the lap join on the other side, which could also be welded or just stitched as desired. I have only punched and plug welded to avoid welding on the join at an edge, like a boot rubber flange, or some other place that would have originally been spot welded.(I have tried welding there and cannot make it neat).
I think if you are going to see both sides of the repair, you really need to butt weld it, which is really stretching the abilities of most amateur restorers (though not impossible - I find welding is 95% setup, 5% actual welding, time wise). I also try to match the steel. When I welded the boot floor in a Stude recently, I cut patches from the roof of another.

Cheers, Jarrod.

Usually just full weld, think the punch is more for using rivets or screws to hold the panels together before welding.
Welding both sides makes for a really strong joint but not really needed. Just run some good sealer along the seam to keep water out.
Also depends on what you doing, say modifying a transmission tunnel. Our licensing people like a lap weld with both sides welded
Cheers Steve

Thanks for the info guys!!

Bugly, I don't have the skills to do "nice" welding

Hey, I can relate to this Jarrod!! I'm the same ... I also rely heavily on the grinder!!