Welding course advice needed

[ChooChooMike]

I'd like advice on which of 2 welding classes to take at my local community college.

I'm almost a complete newbie at welding. I took a general metals course 4 years ago and got introduced to oxy/acetylene, TIG & MIG welding.

Class 1:

Welding 21- Basic Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW)
3 units; 2 hours lecture, 4 hours lab
Credit, degree applicable
This is a basic course in shielded metal arc
welding designed to provide the student
with manipulative cutting and welding
skills in the flat and horizontal fillet posi-
tions. The course also includes a study of
welding nomenclature, equipment, occu-
pational safety, joint design, electrode clas-
sification, weld symbols, and blueprint
reading.

Class 2:

Welding 40abcd - Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW), Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW)
3 units; 2 hours lecture, 4 hours lab
Credit, degree applicable
In this course, students will develop
manipulative skills using Gas Tungsten Arc
Welding (GTAW) and Gas Metal Arc Weld-
ing (GMAW) processes on ferrous and non-
ferrous alloys. Emphasis is placed on the
requirements for certification in accor-
dance with AWS D.17.1:2001, specifica-
tions for Fusion Welding for Aerospace
Applications (formerly Mil-Standard-
1595A Qualifications of Aircraft, Missile
and Aerospace Fusion Welders).

My aim is to gain some general welding skills/knowledge, no particular goal at this point. These are 2 of the available classes I can make.

So any advice on which is more practical for general use is appreciated. Depending on availability in the fall, I may then take the other one.

I'm leaning towards the arc welding if I can get in the class as it's full at the moment and am going tonite to see if the instructor will let me in anyway (folks tend to drop classes pretty quickly).

Thanks !
Mike

 

[Kermit]

Take the stick course first. Stick welding is the less easy of the welding methods but the oldest and most widespread. EVERYONE has a friend with a a stick welding machine. You'll need more practice at stick welding and if you start with MIG welding - it's so easy by comparison you'll likely never use a stick welder.

I learned both and prefer the mig wire feed type welder because its so fast and easy, but I've got a little 90amp 115volt stick welder at the house and knowing how to use it has been very handy over the years. ;D

Kermit

 

[rake60]

I never had a welding lesson myself.
I bought a wire feed welder, read the manual and started making sparks.
The early attempts looked like turkey s#!t on a dead leaf.
Now it's just a simple fact of pushing a puddle of molten steel to form
a weld fillet.

Rick

 

[kvom]

The second course it for TIG welding, which can be quite difficult for a beginner. It also requires a generally more expensive welder and consumables. Most home welding tasks can be accomplished by MIG welding (GMAW). As others have posted, you can learn MIG at home by just getting lots of practice on scrap. My Lincoln MIG welder came with an instruction video that was a good starting point, although I had watched others weld many times previously.

Stick welding is useful for outdoors, where wind can play havoc with the shielding gas for MIG. Stick welders are less expensive.

The main advantage of TIG is the ability to weld aluminum and cast iron, which MIG generally can't do.

 

[rickharris]

ALong the lines of this thread I saw a 1060's advert for a Solidox gas welder - Seemed like a good idea and to my suprise it is still around today - At least ebay says it is - Has any one any experience.

I guess the materials would prohibit the sale in the UK though.

 

[jpaul]

Mike,

I would suggest that you take which ever course you are allowed to and that fits your schedule. The fact that you are taking the class for your own personal benefit will motivate you to read between the lines.

I have heard people say that if you can gas weld, electric welding is easy. Next, if you can stick weld you can weld with a wire feed . And so on to Tig. I think that this reasoning was a product of process availability and technical evolution. Today, you can more easily acquire a MIG outfit then an Oxy Acetylene set.

Like Russ says it is all a mater of "pushing the puddle of molten metal". Jump in, head or foot first, just get in!

 

[BobWarfield]

Try for a course that includes gas welding. You'll probably want a torch for a lot of other reasons in the shop, and learning how to control one well enough to braze and weld covers a lot of basics that will be helpful in a variety of tasks. The torches are very easy to come by and you can rent the cylinders of gas from the same place you'll go to buy gas and consumables for your electric welder.

Beyond that, your choices are stick, Mig, and Tig.

My first course was a gas and Tig. It is definitely hard stuff to learn as was mentioned, but if I'm going to be in a classroom environment getting lots of feedback, I wanted to learn the hard stuff. Once you can Tig, I found Mig and stick to be dead easy to pick up. I took a second semester blacksmithing course that was a lot of fun. Lots more new stuff to learn. In that course I covered blacksmithing, but also got my first teaching exposure to plasma cutters and Migs. The Mig took all of 10 minutes to get a decent bead having learned Tig, but the plasma proved a little more challenging. There were tricks to be learnt!

Now with all that said, probably the most useful welder to have in the house would be a Mig, which narrowly beats the torch. I have a torch and a Tig. I can get it done with the Tig, but it takes me longer than it would with a Mig. I like the Tig for its flexibility and feel. Nothing like it for that. But for laying lots o' bead, I have a Mig on my wish list. Next time I have a really big fabrication project, I'll probably wind up getting one.

Cheers,

BW

 

[ChooChooMike]

Thanks for the advice and suggestions everyone Thm:

I would suggest that you take which ever course you are allowed to and that fits your schedule. The fact that you are taking the class for your own personal benefit will motivate you to read between the lines.

These are the 2 evening classes I can actually fit into my work schedule. At last check online, the "stick" class was full with a full waiting list. The TIG/MIG had a few openings. Generally speaking, there's a few students that just never show up for the class and others that drop it early on for whatever reasons (too lazy, realize that it'll require work, etc.) So by just showing up for a class, there's a fair chance I can get in.

There is a general welding class that covers most of the various welding/cutting types - oxy/stick/TIG/MIG/plasma/etc. But that is an 8-credit hour class and meets every morning for 4-5 hours. That'd be the ideal class, but work interferes with that option LOL

I don't really have a welding goal at this point other than general knowledge.

In the metals class I took a few years ago, I got a quick intro to oxy/TIG/MIG and a smidge of brazing. By far, I picked up MIG the easiest. Once I got the hang of it, I welded all my scraps into a bigger pile of scrap, make a bead with my name on it and called it "art"

TIG was a challenge and finally got a couple of good beads/welds with it before I used up all the gas in the tank and that was the end of that. I had problems with grounding and the metal cooling off too fast. Even had a slight redneck tan to show where I didn't button up the protective vest enough !

Oxy was challenging too, blowing holes all the time in the metal (1/16" or 3/32" thick). Part of that problem was the pressure on the oxy or acetylene (or both) was too high and that was spattering the puddle and blowing the holes - more like cutting then welding .

Try for a course that includes gas welding. You'll probably want a torch for a lot of other reasons in the shop, and learning how to control one well enough to braze and weld covers a lot of basics that will be helpful in a variety of tasks. The torches are very easy to come by and you can rent the cylinders of gas from the same place you'll go to buy gas and consumables for your electric welder.

I don't currently have any welding equipment as I live in an apartment and am just building little steam engines. At the very least, I'll probably do some brazing and/or silver soldering to build up some of the engine components. I do some volunteer work at a RR museum, working on the 12" : 1' scale steam locomotives, so the welding skills just might come in handy there !

Heck, I started out in beginning machineshop class in 2004 and wound up getting my machinist Certificate of Incompetence last summer !! & I'm a computer software engineer/nerd by profession. Maybe the next goal will be a welding certificate !! Stranger things have happened.

So, now I'm leaning towards the MIG/TIG class which might be a bit more practical for home shop stuff from what you guys seem to be thinking. Then maybe in the fall, I can take the stick class. Looks like both of the classes are given each semester.

I took a second semester blacksmithing course that was a lot of fun. Lots more new stuff to learn.

I too a 1/2-day beginning blacksmith shop 6-7 years ago. That was a lot of fun ! So much can be learned there too. My arm was spaghetti after that, to the point where all I could do was kinda lift the hammer and let it fall instead of putting some force behind it

Mike

 

[Kermit]

I've seen stick welders on sale at Northern Tool for $79. Sometimes even cheaper at places like harbor freight.

That being said once more, if you go MIG I doubt you'll ever even pick up a stick.

 

[ChooChooMike]

I was just flipping thru Horror Fright's sales rag I found on my desk. They have a stick rig for $90, flux wire welder for $120, flux/MIG rig for $200, plasma cutter for $650 and an oxy/acetylene setup for $170 with no tanks and $280 with tanks. Small tanks are 10ft3 acetylene or 20ft3 oxygen for $80.

I'm sure all made in China/India/wherever

Mike

 

[hitandmissman]

If you do get a set of oxy/acetylene tanks it is best to buy/rent them from a local dealer that refills them. Some will not fill tanks that are not theirs.