Has ANybody Welded USING!!!!.....

Has ne body any experience in welding using lead and a blow torch! u know if u dont have a mig welder!

is this a good method?? if ur on a budget and dont have the faciclites or is it beetter to just get mesh and some fibergalss or filler with metal shavings in?

Lead and a blow torch (lead loading) is classic method of body filling after repairs but should not be used for welding metal together, wouldn't be strong enough. Esp. if structural area, only use proper welding method, not even fibre glass/filler! 8O

Rally cars used to use lead brazing round areas such as the widscreen to allow for flex in the shell. I don't know what is used nowadays or if its still common practise…. just what I've heard. Any body know??? :dontknow:

Not sure about that, but again brazing is not strong enough for structural areas.

c11rgd - why dont you tell us exactly what you need to repair and we can maybe then help on best options for you?

what type of a welder do i need then? not major woek just need to do the end of sill and rear wheel arech sills and some small holes

MIG (Metal inert gas) welders are probably best for car body work in general. I use a little Clarke rig that you can use with or without gas.

Lead loading is totally different to welding.  Whoever has told you it's an alternative is givving you duff information.  It's used by the classic car boys instead of good old P38 filler (bodge) as you can play it with the blow torch - but can't sand it 'coz it's lead and the dust is leathal.

You want to get a nice Turbo MIG - dead easy, cheap and effective.  Other options are ARC (stick welder) but they are usually far too heavy duty for car body work, Oxy Acetaline but that needs big bottle athough you can weld rust with it or TIG but that is simply far too expensive.

DO NOT BUY A GASSLESS MIG - they are little better than useless.  Get a decent Gas one and use CO2 Argon mix.  Most car body work you'll be using .6 wire with.  You could do worse than a look in machine mart - the Clarke ones are pretty good and not too much money either.

Best of luck,


Steve

Hey Steve my Clarke can be used in gasless mode and is pretty good!  :posh: The gasless welders use wire that also contains the flux and for small jobs are more than adequate. If you've got a big job to do it?s probably easier using gas as it?s neater.

I think half the skill in mig welding is getting used to your equipment and knowing how to set up the power/feed rate….. the rest is technique.

well im not building th e car i just want something simple that will fill up holes, and gaps and usual rust holes etc no bigger that the size of my palm, maybe even smaller and jsut eh seams, where the inner arch joins the external! u know things lke that, not really welding panels or sections!

i dont want to be buying something imonly gonna use once u know wat i mean?

so really something simple i guess!

You can pick up mig welders quite reasonably brand new, for example there was a Clarke 150 a few years back which won the what car supertest! Get as good a powered gas set as you can because you can then also use it for other things, but as the chaps have already said, you will just blow holes in your bodywork if you use too high a power! Good luck!  

The areas of a modern car in the crumple zone are sometimes brazed, not welded, so that they retain their 'crumple' capability.

Regarding buying a MIG welder for not much use, I'd 100% recommend you do, because if you can weld it opens up a world of opportunity for getting cars back on the road which would otherwise be scrapped. Also, if you spread the word about that you're a welder, I am sure over time enough people will put work your way for the little welding jobs that older cars sometimes need to get through an MoT.

I use a turbo mig set up, it pretty good for a 180 quid, i highly recomend gettin one if wanna have a go at welding, keeps the price down if you can do it your self, the gasless ones are pretty crap, dont flow very well and the gases given off, are quite dangerous too.

I learnt to weld in work a couple of years ago, and did all the welding on me car, saved a hell of a lot money, and you can look back at your own work. :wink:

hmmm some good suggestions!

its just that u know when u need something u need it bad, and i know once the cars done and ive moved on, its just gonna be sitting there or on ebay after a while until the next time i need one, would rather put some of that money towards the car or somehting!

neways thanx

any one recommend a basic model or starter model or something!

Chances are that your next car will need welding at some point too if you're sticking with MK1 Golfs! :wink:

The Clarke welders aren't too bad, SIP always used to get good reviews in the classic mags. B&Q sell one (online only?) called 'Cosmo' (From memory) which I'm told is just a re-badged SIP unit.

Worth spending bit extra on gas one with a bit of power, you may get into welding and want/need to do bigger repairs in the future. Don't want to sound pessimistic, but you may find some of those holes that are small at the moment will get a bit bigger when you start cutting, grinding and cleaning up prior to welding. Rust can be a bit like an iceberg - what you see on the surface is far more extensive underneath 8O ….good luck.

hmm tru say, might just invest in one now, c if i can get hold of a decent second hand one from either a mate or car boot or sumthing! if ne one has a good one let me kno! thanx