Im getting ready to weld, a few questions:
Never welded before and im in a 1 car garage.
Im welding full floor boards, how much spray of fire do you get when you weld? will i have many sparks flying around in my interior?
How do you see out of the helmet? when i put it on i cant see anything! how can i weld if its so dark under the helmet?

If you're a novice welder, one of the most difficult things to learn is how to position your MIG gun near your weld before squeezing the trigger, and then laying the weld bead where you want it. With a MIG, it is a bit easier since you can put the wire right on the spot you intend to weld. The trick most welders use is to adjust the tensioners on the headband of the welding hood so you can flip the hood down over your face with a nod of your head. Don't loosen them so much that the hood falls down when you don't want it to. This works whether you're using a MIG or stick machine, but with a stick welder, you cannot touch the rod to your work until you're ready to strike an arc. You just put the rod tip as close to your work as possible without striking the arc before flipping your hood down. That's is how you deal with a dark lens. You don't see anything until you actually start welding. But do not, under any circumstances, look at the arc without a welding hood and the proper shade lens. The light is very highly ultraviolet, and you will burn the surface of your eyes, and this is very painful.

As for the sparks; you will get some splatter. You'll have an area about six to eight inches around the weld arc that is being splattered with sparks at any given time. You should be okay as long you are welding the floor. Be careful not to hit any gas lines or brake lines or wiring. Make sure there's no gas or other flammable liquids being stored in the garage. If you're welding trunk floors, it would be a good idea to pull the gas tank and store it in a safe location away from the welding. Be sure all the side panels are removed from the interior.

If you have never welded before, I would say a floor pan project is one of the tougher jobs for a novice to complete. If possible, get an experienced friend to help with the work.

Also, practicing welding on a car is a very poor idea. You should feel very confortable with your welding capabilities before your even think of trying to weld any type of panel in/on your car.

If you have any doubts about your ability to fabricate/weld, you may be better off paying someone to do the work for you. If you mess up, it may cost more in the end to fix any mistakes.

I don't mean to be negative, but his is a reality.

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Malibu Motorsports (http://www.malibumotorsports.cjb.net)
414 ci bbc, pump gas, 3500 lbs
10.66 @ 125 1/4 mile
6.74 @ 101 1/8 mile
1.47 60' on 9" tire

First you need to remove any thing that can and would catch fire. Practice is a must!! Get very comfortable welding different types before you strike an arc on the car. Practice the butt, lap, spot welds.

Also learn to operate the welder right. Learn the different adjustments on the welder needed for each type of weld. Listen and pay attention how the weld sounds and looks. You will get a nice constat BZZZZZZ and a nice even light emitting. If you dont get that nice BZZZ or the light seems choppy the welder is not set up right.

Once you start welding you will be able to see out of the helmet, but make sure you have the right tint of lense. A 10 or 11 is the proper shade of lens to protect your eyes, any less and damage can occur. The best thing Ive ever bought is a self darken helmet. You can see out of them before welding kinda like looking through sunglasses, but once you strike an arc it darkens up.

Also you must protect your self. Wear leather gloves jeans and long sleeved tshirt. Also wear some type of breathing mask under the helmet. I made that mistake of not wearing one 5 years ago and spent 2 nights in the hospital getting my lungs pumped and cleaned out. Ever since my breathing capaticy is shot, God help me if I ever have to run more then a block someday. Zinc oxide posion is not a fun deal to go through, am grateful that someone found me passed out, otherwise I might not be here!! So protect yourself agaist the fumes.

Do a search on welding there you will find many great topics about welding types, tips and general welding knowledge...Eric

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1970 chevelle
1970 chevelle SS455 not a typo its a BUICK BABY
1949 and 1972 chevy trucks
http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/sevt_chevelles

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/102-7496720-8332961
this is a reference for some books to consider the basics books are very good
frank these guys just gave you some great advise the only thing i have to add is get a book and read it first not to learn how to weld that is only learned by practice but to learn what your looking at when you start they the basics books will guide you and show you how to set up the machine safety and what a good weld and bad weld looks like. it will also start you welding the easier welds and prodress you to the more difficult ones.
by the way like eric said the auto darkening helmet is worth its weight in gold especially for someone learning

Frank66,

I found this through a link in a previous post. You can do a search using "basic" as the keyword, and MARTINSR has a lot of good info on this site. Here are a couple of links to the forums:
http://www.chevelles.com/forum/Forum3/HTML/006730.html
http://www.chevelles.com/forum/Forum3/HTML/007134.html

These have some excellent info for welding.

What type of welder are you using? Arc, MIG, TIG? 110/220 volt supply? Have you done any welding before? Especially thinner sheets/panels? Welding thin panels is a LOT different than doing 1/8" to 1/4" plate.

Read all you can, and get some junk panel material to practice on. If you're going to be doing a lot of welding on your car, they make Auto-Dimming helmets. You can see through until you strike an arc, then the lens darkens in approx 0.25 seconds or less. I used one in the machine shop I worked at a few years back, and it was awesome. I'm not an expert welder, but I can generally fuse two pieces of metal together. http://www.chevelles.com/forum/biggrin.gif

Good Luck.
Jim

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Slower Traffic Keep Right
72 Chevelle Malibu
90 Chevy C1500
2000 H-D Electra Glide Classic

Oops, forgot to mention...

Wear leather gloves and a long sleeve shirt with the collar buttoned. This will prevent you from getting the dreaded welders tan (a.k.a. SUNBURN) http://www.chevelles.com/forum/eek.gif The sunburn you get in a short period of time is rather painfull, so please be carefull.

When you practice welding, try to approximate the body position you will use when doing the actual welds.

Okay, that's it. I'll shut up now http://www.chevelles.com/forum/wink.gif

Jim

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Slower Traffic Keep Right
72 Chevelle Malibu
90 Chevy C1500
2000 H-D Electra Glide Classic

Thanks for all the responses, i have read most of the topics posted under search. I think for my first weld, its better to do floor boards than body panels right? how bad can i screw up the floor? If i wanted to send it to someone to do, how much am I talking about for two full floor boards? I have a hard time doing this because i bought a welder already. Is it true that gas weld is easier than flux core for a beginner? i dont mind using a flux core, i dont care how it looks, it will be covered.
I will look into the auto lens, if i cant see well i dont know how long to hold the butt weld.

frank

Frank, all the above suggestions are good. I prefer to wear a denim or heavy khaki shirt with long sleeves. T-shirt material burns through very easily. Get a welder's cap too. It will protect your scalp from the occasional splatter that will get up there. I've had my share of scalp burns. Mildly unpleasant if nothing more. And the hair stinks when it burns.

Go to the hardware store and pick up a few pieces of sheet metal. They sell small pieces cheap. Practice on them a little until you get familiar with what you're doing. You'll be amazed at how quickly you'll pick it up.

Also, get a good light for your welding area. The inside of a car is very dark for welding on the floors. I have a 400 watt mercury vapor "drop light", but you don't need to go that extreme. http://www.chevelles.com/forum/wink.gif Just light it up good so that when you raise the hood you're not engulfed in darkness.

Clean the flux off the weld each time you stop.

I also agree that floorboards are better to learn on than body panels. But little pieces of sheetmetal are even better than that.

One other thing that helps me a lot. I hold my right wrist (trigger hand) with my left hand whenever possible, with my left wrist resting on something solid. This helps me hold the gun steadily as I start the weld and as I work the bead. If you have a very steady arm, you may not need to do this.

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My Web Site (http://www.landry-family.com) (updated 01-04-03)

"Long Live Freedom!"

Chad Landry
TC Member #643
ACES Member #4556
'68 El Camino

[This message has been edited by cjlandry (edited 02-17-2003).]

And sheetmetal welding is done differently than welding thicker pieces mild steel. When sheetmetal welding, you are are not going to weld any one spot more than a second or two at a time. What you're really doing is welding a multiple number of tack welds that you eventually string together. This is done for two reasons; one, to prevent burn through and two, to prevent warpage. You make a tack weld, and move to another area, make another tack weld, move to another area, and so forth and so on until you have one solid weld bead.

When I tack weld to the cross members i need to drill a hole in the floor and not in the crossmember right? and one more thing, when i clamp to the floor board, i cant touch it with my other hand, or any metal, in order to hold it in place? because of the circuit. If this is true, this will make it more difficult for me because of my tight space in the garage.
thanks
frank

Frank, just a bit of advice. Make sure you cover all of the glass in the car with something (preferrably not flammable) to protect them. The welding spatter will severely pit the windows. I had pits on my glass from welding my floors (live and learn). I think I can buff some of the pitting out, but some of it will be permanent. Fortunately, I have a spare set of glass. Good luck.

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Tom Wood
Gold Member #66
502 Powered '66 SS

Some pictures of my '66 under construction;
http://home.attbi.com/~tkmwood55/

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>when i clamp to the floor board, i cant touch it with my other hand, or any metal, in order to hold it in place? because of the circuit. If this is true, this will make it more difficult for me because of my tight space in the garage.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If you are using a MIG, you can hold what you are welding with your leather glove. Just do not get your finger between the metal and the wire.

I always use tons of clamps, and I'm not ashamed to sheet-metal screw stuff together before I weld. Which is the way I'd suggest holding the pan to the braces.

Throw back to my ARC welding days....Best Weld I ever did, was when I welded my father-in-laws bench vise closed. It was holding the 1/4" metal I was SUPPOSED to be welding.

I still have the VISE, but had to spend 20 minutes grinding the weld off to use it.

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Springfield, Ohio

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