Anything welding

Why don't you re use the beads? They can be dried in an oven and will absorb moisture again.

 

Hello! I have been playing around with a harbor freight 170 mig. I have just been using flux core till I feel like my skills warrant the purchase of gas. I have done a few successful projects and now I am looking at welding a bead to reinforce my cam tabs. My alignment guy bent one fairly badly and I want to strengthen that one and bullet proof the rest before my 34's go on. Here is a question for those with experience in welding. It is definitely the better idea to drop my lower control arm so I don't heat up the bushing. Would it be reasonable to spot weld and cool with air so I don't need to drop the LCA? Am I trying to cut corners in a way that is reckless? I am not sure I have time to drop the arms until after the new year, so I would like to go ahead and do this before my new tires go on. I have heard people do this without dropping the arm, but people do a lot of things.

 

I am blown away by the price you guys get steel for down south! Here's some local (Toronto GTA) prices for comparison. These are from metal supermarlets and can usually get 10-15% cheaper by in store quote or other local supplier.

Your prices are inline with what I used to pay 20 years ago!! 1" .065 square CREW used to be just under $1/ft now $4/ft is teh minimum price we expect to pay here.

If theres anyone here North of the boarder that knows much better options, I'm all ears.

 

That little desiccant in a tiny container doesn't do very much. I need large volumes of dry air to run my O2 scuba booster. I get big jugs of desiccant on Amazon for about $25. I made this several years ago. It didn't cost much more than buying on off the shelf unit. It's only rated for 125psi, but I have a regulator in front of it anyway.

 

Once they powdercoat it I still won’t be able to see it from my house. I’ve never been a fan of puzzles.

 

Huh? I may have typed that out incorrectly.

It's not about reusing the beads or not, the bowl itself is practically stuck and feels like it will shatter in an attempt to open it.

 

Now that is a desiccant filter

 

Dang, who cut them?

Least it isn't cast aluminum, that stuff sucks to weld.

 

Somebody dropped it and broke it, it was a cast steel piece

 

Well sir, it looks good

We poured our own, and the aluminum used was all recycled from cans, broom handles, you name it

And welding on it? Holy shit

 

See, this is how the cheap filter "screws" together with the use of these plastic tabs



Finally got it apart; it's nasty inside



Replacement arrived



Small comparison, if it matters. The bowl is slightly bigger and the foam filter insert is larger on the CH

The downside is the drain valve on the HF feels tighter



The desiccant side



You can see the bowl is much easier to remove



I figured if plastic alone gets as nasty and as gunked up as it did, I'd use a little preventative on the metal itself



We'll see how she does, hopefully no leaks

 

Consumables arrived just now as well

 

Just paid $10 for a 2' x 3' hot rolled 16 gauge a few minutes ago





And the order of cold rolled recently

 

Its almost worth the drive to pick up at those prices. I wonder how much i could disguise as skid plates crossing back?

 

Just put TRD stick-on emblems on them, they'll never

 

Biscuit

 

This is awesome! Run a pair and you could regenerate one unit while using the other unit.

I'm so humid in the summer, the unit that KV posted would be useless after 2 hours.

I'm not sold on refrigerated air dryers, I think they are more complicated than they need to be.

A desiccant dryer down stream from some copper loops to condense the majority of the water would most likely be fine for what I do.

 

no one else answered so far, so i'll give it a shot. as they say "if you want the right answer online, just confidently post the wrong answer first!"

it's always best to remove the part from the vehicle if possible to weld. i'd also weld in short bursts, and cool with water, not air.

welding on a vehicle tends to have lots of issues-- i do it at work almost daily. you need protection from surges, and sparks.

at work, we use these to protect the vehicles from surges

$129 OTC 3386 Antizap Auto Surge Protector - 12 V

https://www.amazon.com/OTC-3386-Antizap-Surge-Protector/dp/B000F5JLP0

i can't say they definitively stop surge issues, but there haven't been vehicle computer issues with them installed, so 50/50 if it really works, or it's more of a placebo...

there's also significant risk of the jumping sparks going places they shouldn't and melting things. cardboard and blue painters tape can be used, or we use this welding paper because of it's thin and adhesive nature to block or re-direct sparks away from sensitive/painted/melty parts.

$153 3M Welding and Spark Deflection Paper 05916, Flame Retardant, Adhesive Backing, Repositionable, 24 in x 150 ft

https://www.amazon.com/3M-Welding-Spark-Deflection-Paper/dp/B000PENDAK

it's also recommended to use an anti-spatter spray to minimize spatter adhesion to the area around the weld as well. at work, we use a big commercial container of mysterious origins that gets broken down into small spray bottles. i use this stuff at home that does similarly, though is more greasy, which requires more cleanup for painting later, though it does work better than the stuff at work...
https://www.eastwood.com/aervoe-887-welding-anti-spatter.html

basically, it's an expensive pain to weld on a vehicles and keep damage risk to a minimum. it can be done, but becomes more like 'painting' where it might only take 2 minutes to weld the part, but 45 minutes of prep, and teardown to protect the area surrounding the component to be welded.

 

Ah you got it; I didn't even see his post otherwise I would've replied

As for the LCA's, I'd absolutely remove them before welding on said tabs.

Do it once, do it right especially since the welding job itself seems like a 5 minute job. It's just work removing and reinstalling said parts but once that's all out of the way it'll be smooth sailing.

Goes without saying, make sure to disconnect the battery

 

We have this dryer at work, if you’ll notice it isn’t plugged in and hasn’t been for a while. We have an automatic drain on the compressor that comes on every 30 minutes. That helps a lot and we don’t see much, if any moisture in the hoses.