I was helping my brother dig for a pool, and we were putting the dirt teeth on the Bobcat bucket. I was not wearing safety glasses, I was on the safety committee at work when I worked construction, I was all about hearing protection, glasses, face shields and goggles. It really does only take one time. We were hitting the teeth one with a two pound sledge, and one of the teeth shattered, two bits of steel the size of pencil lead shot into my eye, one went through the retina on the back side. It took 5 surgeons over 5 hours at the University of Illinois Chicago to get it back. I had to get the retina lasered back together, my eye stitched up and filled with gas, and lay on my stomach for a month while my eye healed and filled back on its own with liquid. Once that was done my lens had dried out and I had to get cataract surgery. About a month ago I just broke down and got a secondary cataract removed. Supposedly this should be the last issue I'll have. I still have a scar across the focal area so I see double slightly out of one eye, but it is better than nothing.

As for the welder, I would like to use an electric one. By torch you are referring to like Heliarc right? I've only met a few people who cold do that, seems like a great skill to have. Baby steps.

 

By torch I figured he meant oxy-acetylene. A heliarc TIG is pretty easy to learn. Much easier than any other type of welding I've ever learned. It's like brazing with a torch, but instant on heat. No warming up the metal to start welding, like in brazing or torch welding.

 

I knew a guy who would actually hold an aluminum rod and use a torch to weld aluminum patches in aluminum trench boxes. It looked perfect when done, the bead was awesome. That is what I picture heliarcing as. I could be totally wrong though. I could see that being great for fixing manifolds, or maybe even heads somehow.

 

You have to bake cast iron and get it really hot before welging it. I can be done but they chare an arm and a leg to do it.
I talked to a guy at the strip when pinks was here last year. He had a late 60's early 70's vette with a 555 big block. The thing looked bone stock though, right down to the bias plys. On the dash was a stack of high 9 and low 10 time slips. He had the exhaust manifolds cut in half and ported then welded back together, I was in aww. When I asked what something like that costs he said "don't ask." I said where is the cage and he goes " I usually get one pass before they kick me off the track, but today I'm tryin to pedal it into the 11's." He didn't make it on the show.

 

I've had engines welded before and it's not that expensive. But engines generally don't have a ton of welding needed or they just get junked out. I imagine if you cut an entire exhaust manifold in half it would cost a lot to have the whole thing welded the entir cicumference!
Cast welding requires the parts not only be heated before welding, but during welding. Then once the welding is done they go back in the oven to slowly lower the temp or they'll crack! It also requires ni rod (nickel rod) to properly weld.
Welding aluminum with a torch is almost impossible for all but a master class welder. The difference between getting proper heat and the part melting is extremely close! If it's not almost ready to collapse from melting, the aluminum filler wont adhere. I see those scam artists welding pop cans at the fairgrounds with their low temp phoney rod, but that's about all it's good for; pop cans.

 

The guy I know who welds the aluminum with a torch I would consider a master welder. He was the one who welded all the hooks on the buckets, and any trench boxes or underground shielding stuff. It had to be super strong in bad ground, and he was our guy for it.

I don't want anything fancy, I'd just like to be able to make my own stuff. I'll probably go about teaching myself.

 

yikes man, that story about your eye is rough. I have a buddy of mine, back in the day when we played paintball, he was cleaning his gun and mumbling to himself, "don't look down the barrel, don't look down the barrel" and then we hear *Pop* and he's over there holding his eye. Blind in that eye for a long time, now he can see B&W outta it.

I got a mig welder sitting around the place. I'm not good at it, but then again i never gave it much time. Lemme tell you something though.
#1: invest in a good mask, one that only "dims" when you welding, else you're blind the whole freak'n time unless you're welding or looking at the sun
#2: two words for you: Long sleeves

 

Got the floor pan welded in last night! Father in law got some new tips for the welder, and that seemed to be the ticket. Unbelievable. So now I can move on to some more POR15ing and start working on getting some poor man's Dynomat down.

 

Good for you man. Moving right along. For what it's worth when I did my peel and seal (from Lowes) I also purchased some stuff from the carpet section to put under my carpet. It was pretty cheap and only about 1/4 inch thick. It was a felt/cloth like material that is great for an added noise barrier.

 

My carpet is jute backed, but I may go with some extra stuff you put under laminate too and put it on the vertical surfaces. I've still got to go and see the stuff at Lowes. How many rolls did it take?