OK fellas, I need your help! I have just spent the last 5 years up to my elbows in fiberglass (restored an old vette) and am now starting a 66 Chevelle. My question is can you safely weld galvanized steel? I need to fabricate some panels and the local hardware store has sheet steel of roughly the right gauge but its galvanized and I seem to remember that the fumes from welding galvanized were pretty harmful. At least I thought I heard that or read it somewhere.

Now I know that the fiberglass resin has reduced my chances of ever being eligible for an AARP discount, but I don't want to completely eliminate my chances. So can I SAFELY weld galvanized or not (and no cracks about burn through or warpage please) Thanks!

Galvanized metal will DEFINITELY put off dangerous fumes. Why not just get some non galvanized?

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1965 Buick Gran Sport Convertible
1965 Buick Skylark H/T

It can be done, but you need to grind the surface off a bit to get down to the parent metal. Wear a respirator.

Naval jelly or muriatic acid will eat off the zinc. But these can be messy and unhealthy too.

Where I work we most of the product we work with is galvanized. It can be welded, with difficulty on the lighter guages but of course you have to dress the welds because the galvanizing is burnt away. The fumes will make you sick as hell, got too much of it myself once and woke up in the night convinced I was having a heart attack. Go with the cold rolled steel it's probably a bit harder to find as most hardware stores only carry galvanized. Or do like my body man does, cut up old doors or hoods for patch metal.

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69 El Camino
http://www.chevelles.com/feature/dec98.html

I realize that JC Whitney is a bad word around here, but they have small pieces of sheet steel for less than $10. Bought a 4' by 4' sheet myself a while back. Works fine. You may even want some fuzzy dice and some cup holders while you're there. http://www.chevelles.com/forum/wink.gif

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My Elky Page (http://www.geocities.com/chadjlandry/index.html) Updated 7-21-00
"Think for yourself. Don't let popular opinion make your decisions for you."
Chad Landry
TC Member #643
'68 El Camino