27 replies to this topic

[sledgehammer]

You mean the 600 gram ones

[Tamworthbay]

Those are crap but they arent 110 litre, I have a big bottle that is only 9 litres unless we are getting our wires crossed

the proper bottles are often listed on their nominal volume, e.g how much water they would hold. The little ones quote the amount of gas they hold. I think a 9 litre one holds around 450 litres of gas, but I think some are higher pressure and hold 600 ish. Sorry to confuse the issue!

[Hendred]

Hobbyweld 5, bottle about a metre high

[Hendred]

Yes thats right, I was giving the water level measurement

[Tamworthbay]

These were the ones I was on about:

http://www.machinema...ix-gas-cylinder

Complete waste of time and money.

[Hendred]

I got one of those with my welder, didn't even use it as only CO2 and as you say lasts 5mins, chucked it in cupboard

[sledgehammer]

I use 50L 200 bar at work - about 5 ft tall

 

at home 10L 200 bar about 3 ft tall

 

another thing to remember is to turn off at main gas tap as soon as you finish - it's easy to forget

 

and any leaks in between welder & bottle will lose gas quickly - you can almost hear the money trickling away

 

on a mild day - the reg should be cool to the touch when in use -

 

if sweating - too much gas -

 

if frozen way too much gas

 

pub gas (co2) is ok if you can get it - but quite active - so welds hotter

Edited by sledgehammer, 31 July 2014 - 08:30 PM.

[Hendred]

I always turn off main gas tap off as heard horror stories of people coming back to weld and to no gas!

[sledgehammer]

I always turn off main gas tap off as heard horror stories of people coming back to weld and to no gas!

 

That's what I meant - must be disheartening

[Hendred]

Very disheartening and bloody annoying!  I would be gutted

[ibrooks]

The hobby bottles aren't as bad as all that - I can get several hours welding out of them. I'm convinced that these stupid "5 minutes" comments are down to people wasting gas due to mega gas flow, leaks or leaving them connected to the welder when not in use. There's no way that they last such short times when used properly.

 

That said... litre for litre they are far more expensive than a "full sized" bottle. I have a 9l bottle of CO2 that I use for normal stuff on the MIG and a slightly larger bottle of Argon that I use on the TIG. I have quick release fittings in the gas lines so that I can easily disconnect the welders from the bottles for moving around but it also means that I can easily switch the Argon bottle onto the MIG if I'm doing something different with it. I've also still got the facility to use a hobby bottle on the MIG if I'm taking it out-and-about rather than using it in the workshop.

 

As has already been said when you aren't welding turn the valve on the bottle off. Regulators, valves in the MIG and joints in pipes will almost certainly not be gas tight so gas will be leaking whilst you aren't there. With the hobby bottles turn the reg back to zero AND spin it off the bottle - zero is seldom really zero on those regs.

 

Iain

[Tamworthbay]

The hobby bottles aren't as bad as all that - I can get several hours welding out of them. I'm convinced that these stupid "5 minutes" comments are down to people wasting gas due to mega gas flow, leaks or leaving them connected to the welder when not in use. There's no way that they last such short times when used properly.
 
That said... litre for litre they are far more expensive than a "full sized" bottle. I have a 9l bottle of CO2 that I use for normal stuff on the MIG and a slightly larger bottle of Argon that I use on the TIG. I have quick release fittings in the gas lines so that I can easily disconnect the welders from the bottles for moving around but it also means that I can easily switch the Argon bottle onto the MIG if I'm doing something different with it. I've also still got the facility to use a hobby bottle on the MIG if I'm taking it out-and-about rather than using it in the workshop.
 
As has already been said when you aren't welding turn the valve on the bottle off. Regulators, valves in the MIG and joints in pipes will almost certainly not be gas tight so gas will be leaking whilst you aren't there. With the hobby bottles turn the reg back to zero AND spin it off the bottle - zero is seldom really zero on those regs.
 
Iain

Do the maths, 110 litres, ideal flow rate 5-15litre per minute depending who you listen to. Twenty minutes tops. Even spread out that is an hour and a half tops. Anymore and you begin to find that the quality of the weld suffers. It is possible to mig weld with no gas but I wouldn't want to be in a crash in a car that had been repaired that way.

[ibrooks]

I never said how many litres per minute I use - I wouldn't know as I adjust it by ear and by "feel" when welding. Assuming the relationship is as linear as that then I must be using far less than 5 litres per minute but I'd question whether the gauges talked about here are really measuring litres per minute and how accurate they are anyway. My reg has two pressure gauges which show bottle pressure and line pressure (torch side). I couldn't even tell you what the torch side pressure gauge reads when I'm welding as I don't use that to set the gas.

 

Iain