Annealing weld wire

[Joe Sullivan]

I'm my own worse enemy trying to make this stuff. It was the same thing when I made the other two locks. Important things just escape me. I don't mind fixing my mistakes but this wire I'm welding with is making it 10 times more difficult.

I drilled the holes in the bridal from my layout then I drilled the arbor hole by scaling the picture.

The cock location looks fine but the bridal hung over about a 1/32. I needed to move the axis hole in the bridal.

So I welded it up, spatter all over the part, Re-measured and drilled but the weld is so hard the the bit walked.
The reel of wire says "soft steel" on it. I heated it up with the propane torch and drilled again but it walked again.

The drill was all the way in the chuck. I round filed the hole but of corse it's got to be fixed again.

I know I have a problem focusing and I don't really mind fixing my mistakes. I don't get mad, I just fix it but this wire problem is getting me downhearted.

How do I anneal this stuff. Is it nessasary to start the forge and bring it to cherry red?
How do you guys assemble. Any pointers so I can avoid this all together?

 

[stronics]

I take it you mig welded it. That wire can be really hard. I don't believe you can anneal it before using it. Any chance of Heli-arcing it?
You may need a carbide drill.
David

 

[Holland501]

Bring it to "cherry red" and let it air cool at room temp. With a well located center punch it will drill with no problem. Good luck.

 

[Birddog6]

You should be using mild wire, gas shield, short quick bursts & wait a few second in between. Should have very little splatter.
When done, heat it cherry red & let it cool naturally, don't quench it. If that don't work, heat it cherry red & stick it down in a bucket of play sand & let it cool.

I weld up lockplates & tangs & etc. quite often, seldom have a problem with them being too hard to drill.

Keith Lisle

 

[Joe Sullivan]

Thank you for the infomation. I was able use it and get the lock parts together. I intermitted the arc and I was able to file the excess weld off which I have'nt been able to do. Before, the file would glance off. It does say mild steel on the spool of forney .032 flux core. I don't understand why it get so hardened. I started a fire and annealed it by air cooling, Sharpened my center punch and punched deep, using titanium bit, drilled thru fine. It makes a mess putting them back in the fire but it's what I'm gonna have to do I guess.
Thank you
Joe

 

[LRB]

Titanium bits are just thin coated and IMO a waste of money. Try a cobalt bit next time. You may avoid the anneal.

 

[jdkerstetter]

+1 for cobalt bits. They will drill through most anything. I have a wire guage number set that I keep on the bench and turn to for almost all of my work.

Enjoy, J.D.

 

[Joe Sullivan]

I've been thinking about it. I wonder if the molten mild steel is sucking the carbon out of the good steel and hardening it. I'll look around for the cobalt bits. I'm pretty sure I have the right index on this lock so the chances are good that I'm through making mistakes for now. If I had cobalt bits for #4 thur #8, tap and clearance, set aside for this, I'd be better off.

 

[Birddog6]

The reason you are getting splatter is the flux core wire. Get a bottle for the welder & use the gas shield & you will be amazed of the dif in the welding & cleanliness of the results. No slag & you can easily fill any voids & not have slag in them.


Keith Lisle

 

[Bill Hall]

Bring it to "cherry red" and let it air cool at room temp. With a well located center punch it will drill with no problem. Good luck.

That's it :thumbsup: . Even welds using mild steel filler tend to be pretty hard compared to the parent metal. Steel has a micro-structure (grain), that has a consistent direction across a solid piece, like a lockplate. When you weld on that piece, the grain of the filler metal and surrounding metal go in a bunch of different directions, making a sort of reinforced micro-structure that tends to be pretty hard. When you heat the metal past its re-crystalization point (a fancy way of saying heating to cherry red), the micro-structure of the filler metal and parent metal tend to line up in one direction. This is called "normalizing", almost the same as annealing, but slightly different. Once the micro-structure is in a common direction, the metal around the weld seems softer, and is easier to work. I may not have explained it exactly right, I just used my own vernacular :surrender: .

Normalizing also helps with work-hardened metal. Many folks mistakenly call it annealing, but it's nearly the same technique, so it really doesn't matter. Bill

 

[LRB]

Only rolled steel has a grain direction, and once heated to a red heat the grain changes in shape and no longer has direction, and it will not return regardless of further heating. Work hardened metal is the result from stresses. I am not sure what causes a weld to be noticably harder, but possibly stresses from rapid grain growth from the intense heat of welding which would be relieved by a normalizing process. The last part of this post is just a SWAG, but the hardening is not due to grain direction, or lack of.

 

[Bill Hall]

Hey, I was partially right :grin: . I do know that normalizing will soften the welded area or any work hardened area. Bill

 

[LRB]

It is an interesting phenomenon. I don't believe my guess is fully correct either, but I will see what I can find out about it. I do think it is stress related though, caused by the super high heat of the weld. Normalizing reduces grain size and stress relieves to a point.

 

[Joe Sullivan]

I certified stick welding a number of years back and I've welded with mig too but I can't remember ever trying to file a weld or drilling thru one. Chip the slag and hit it with the angle grinder. All heavy construction so I don't know. This little 110 mig has no gas. It was given to me broken and I got it working. The gas hookups are gone and unless burnsomatic starts selling gas bottles, I won't bother with it.
These weld are hard, not just a little hard. The file glances off like hardened tool steel.

 

[Bill Hall]

When I was a pipe welder, every now and then I would need to cut out a weld to change a flange or elbow, due to a change order or maybe just pre-work tear-out. Using a hand-held bandsaw (portaband), I found that welds were very difficult to cut, due to their hardness, compared to the mild steel metal of the pipe. I could easily wear out a blade on a 6" pipe weld. I could use the same saw on a virgin sections of pipe, and the blade would last all day, big difference.

Wick, maybe you could tell us more as to why welds are so hard. Most of what I learned about metal, I learned from you anyway :thumbsup: .Bill

 

[stronics]

I was thinking more about this and just remembered that the wire is pretty hard so it will feed through the gun. I use a lot of .023 and .035 and it dosen't bend as easy compared to mild steel.
David

 

[LRB]

I know little to nothing about welding. All that I have found on weld hardness involves too low of a welding temp, lack of pre-heat, and cooling too fast. No exact explaination of why the weld is hard, other than the choice of rods.

 

[schloss]

Like it or not, flux core burns hotter. No way around it, just the nature of the beast. When you do a small weld, your welder will bring the filler material and the parent steel up to welding temp - if it does not, your "weld" will fall out. Once you stop welding, it will immediately begin to cool. If your weld is very small, you have done no preheating, and particularly if you have it stuck in a vise or some other heat sink, it is going to cool very fast. This will make that area very hard.

The suggestion to do short bursts will keep most of the parent material soft, but the area where you are welding is going to become martensitic. But only in that immediate area. I don't recommend doing it.

Normalizing or annealing the piece works (obviously, since you've already found that), the only way to have prevented it in the first place would be to preheat (slows down the cooling rate), and keep it off a heatsink, or pre-heat your heat sink.

Welding is fun stuff. You can weld satisfactorily with flux core, but you will need to clean up during and afterwards. You'll find out more about your welding wire by looking at the numbers on it. Also, many people don't pay attention to the fact that a lot of flux core wire still requires shielding gas. Got to make sure you've got the right stuff.

 

[petew]

Lots of pre heat,grind it smooth, them post heat it to dull cherry, and quickly wrap it in an insulating material, like ceramic insulation fibers, or do the post heat in a sand pail, and cover it in the hot sand to let it cool slowly. Small pieces cool so rapidly it is dificult to have them cool slow enough . Another way is have some coal burning , bury it in the coals, and get it out the next day.
FC wire surface hardens badly, and makes for some very dirty welds if you stop and start on small welds. Bare wire with a shield gas like Blueshield 8 or Argon will be more forgiving, tig is better. You can also oxy acetelene gas weld it with a small tip, and some clean tie wire.

Pete

 

[Joe Sullivan]

Thank to all for the replies. My tool options are pretty sad at this time. I got this little welder. Even with no gas, it's better than nothing. I got three options.
I can't stop making mistakes :haha:
I can stick it back in the coal fire.
I can buy better bits.

Starting a coal fire is like starting a wood fire in the rain. It takes preporation. I guess this is the only way I can anneal the weld. Preheating? That sounds like starting a coal fire :rotf:

The idea of using carbide or cobalt bits is a lot easier. Sinking a good center punch and drill is better if it will work. I'm kinda living on the edge of the world here. We got a hardware and an auto store. they both sell irwin cobalt, titanium and highspeed bits. I don't find the cobalt bits all that good. I think the titanium work better but they walk unless there brand spank'n new.
To get carbide, I'll have to drive 50 miles or buy off the web. This makes the cost high.
This time of year, I got no money to spend. I saved all summer to make it thru till spring. When I was diving, I had the money but no time. Now I'm fishing and have the time but no money. I'm looking a buying a little barrel for the pistol that I'm making now and that will be it for the winter.

I've welded a lot, Underwater and topside. I know how to weld. The science behind a weld never interested me but now, I guess what I was asking was about the science behind this welding wire. Thank you for giving me that. I have a better understanding.