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I have a clarke 150 turbo welder (think thats what it is) and its ok ish.
it has a metal liner, I use argon co2 mix. Sometimes little bottles, sometimes big.
I use 0.6 wire, normally with 0.8 tips.
It welds alright sometimes but you never know whats going to happen when you pull the trigger.
Wire speed seems steady enough, power doesnt seem to vary too much but it will tack, or lay a bead perfectly then a second later when you pull the trigger the weld goes super porous.
I clean as well as possible before welding.
What can cause intermittent porosity?
If I gibe up with it and put my bottle on my mates welder all is good so its not the gas, its not my prep, its got to be my welder.
Its always been a bit shonky but it was normally wire feed issues. That seems sorted now but its still impossible to weld stuff nicely if you don't know whats going to happen when you pull the trigger.
Any thoughts?
If I can het a little list of possible causes ill work through them as I find time. Whats confusing me is it will do a 1" long bead fine, 2 seconds later and try and put another bead down and it may work well, it may not.
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Have you had the casings off and given everything a good clean up/ blown out the dust etc? Check and clean every single connection you can find.
If still no better then go through and check for dry joints in the soldered connections on the circuit board.
Are you running off an extension cable they really don't help matters.
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Intermitant gas leak from torch .
Dirty knackered torch tips or shrouds
Dirty or rusty wire
All worth double checking.
If its not one of those it could be the feed slipping ir not being consistant maybe , might be worth googling if other people have the same problem and brace the rollers like on sip ones .
Actually might be gas solenoid if it has one .
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No extension. err, casings have been off it for years. I guess using a welder with no nice earthed metal shielding between you and the big transformer isnt everyones cup of tea. keep meaning to refit them. They originaly came off to check for loose connections but i wasnt very thorough. loose connections and internal cleanliness will go on the top of my check list then  |
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Intermitant gas leak from torch . Dirty knackered torch tips or shrouds Dirty or rusty wire All worth double checking. If its not one of those it could be the feed slipping ir not being consistant maybe , might be worth googling if other people have the same problem and brace the rollers like on sip ones . Actually might be gas solenoid if it has one . No gas solenoid I don't think. Manual valve in torch. Wire feed does need bracing, but what normally happens is it either feeds, or the roller pops off the side of the wire. wire is new, tips are new and replaced regularly (it does go through tips actually). Shroud is a bit mank, ill replace it, would cause a constant problem though surely? what do you mean by intermittent gas leak from torch? |
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Maybe when you move it in a certain way , like a crack in the gas line that opens and closes.
I admit it is a funny set of symptoms . If evrything else is ok i would google to see if anyone else has had a problem . I gather a few of these diy welding sets have componenets pop on the boards every now and again and the savvy people can just replace a reisistor fro pennies instead of buying a new board .
Not saying thats the problem but it could be if everything else is fine .
Check your earth is not frayed or ' cooked ' [ brittle sort of over heated wire]
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Ill check the gas line in the torch. It is the kind of problem that could easily be due to holding the torch at a certain angle or something.
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fad
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,781
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It sounds like gas to me. How old is the torch and liner?
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It sounds like gas to me. How old is the torch and liner? Torch is as old as the welder (at least 15 years), gas line the same, wire liner I replaced last year. Original plastic one was bad and making the wire jam so I put a metal one in. |
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fad
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,781
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Change the torch and gas line mate, until you know they are good you'll be chasing your backside forever. You can bet your nuts to a barn dance that if you change it, it won't cure the problem, but if you don't and chase other faults first, the problem will be the torch or gas line. Murphy's Law and all that. But that would be my first port of call, there's not much on the rest of the gubbins to go wrong. Gas regulator, gas line, and torch are the most frequent points of issue (total failure is usually in the heavy bit).
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Last Edit: May 9, 2017 21:35:51 GMT by fad
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fad
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,781
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(I'm about to buy a new torch with liner and gas line for my 151TE, though that's cos it is going to get set up as a stainless welder in the unit).
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Don't want to appear flippant but if you experienced welding from a quality branded MIG for a few mins you would throw your old transformer based Clarke straight into the nearest skip - if you weld on a regular basis or want to make the most of your time on the motors - i.e. spend an hour sorting a floor repair rather than all weekend - then set yourself a target - tell the family that you are happy to have a combined birthday / Christmas present and will put funds to it if needs be - Current market, decent quality inverter based MIG's can be had for £350 + and once you have tried one you wont want the old Clarke back - does not resolve you immediate problem but will leave you thinking why the hell you put it up with it in the first place.
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Don't want to appear flippant but if you experienced welding from a quality branded MIG for a few mins you would throw your old transformer based Clarke straight into the nearest skip - if you weld on a regular basis or want to make the most of your time on the motors - i.e. spend an hour sorting a floor repair rather than all weekend - then set yourself a target - tell the family that you are happy to have a combined birthday / Christmas present and will put funds to it if needs be - Current market, decent quality inverter based MIG's can be had for £350 + and once you have tried one you wont want the old Clarke back - does not resolve you immediate problem but will leave you thinking why the hell you put it up with it in the first place. Ive used decent mig welders, I know what your saying, but I cant afford one. Now my bedfords done I hardly weld, just the odd broken mower handle etc. If I take on another rot box I would deffinately set part of the budget aside for a decent welder. This welder is fine for the use it gets these days, or at least it would be if I can get it to be consistent. |
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"I use 0.6 wire, normally with 0.8 tips." - is this a typo? If not - try 0.6 tips with your 0.6 wire. Is it a standard earth cable & clamp? (I have a Clarke Pro90 - the original earth cable & clamp were feeble !) ask on the helpful migwelding-uk forum ? Mine is fine for car repairs, guess yours should be very happy once you find where the gremlin is hiding... Let us know when you find the problem  |
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When you said you used your gas on your friends welder did you use your regulator?
If its easy to try your machine with another reg then do in case its faulty.
Most likely a gas leak though as already discussed.
I noticed you said that you use 0.8 tips for 0.6 wire, why?
I don't think it'll cause the problem you have but you are fitting brand new tips that are effectively in worn condition compared to the wire which wont help with your welding.
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"I use 0.6 wire, normally with 0.8 tips." - is this a typo? If not - try 0.6 tips with your 0.6 wire. Is it a standard earth cable & clamp? (I have a Clarke Pro90 - the original earth cable & clamp were feeble !) ask on the helpful migwelding-uk forum ? Mine is fine for car repairs, guess yours should be very happy once you find where the gremlin is hiding... Let us know when you find the problem No typo. I find it works best that way. I have 0.6 and 0.8 wire and both size tips. Still has stock earth lead and clamp. I know all these things are less than ideal but it litreraly will do good tacks and bad tacks, good beads and bad beads with nothing changing. |
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When you said you used your gas on your friends welder did you use your regulator? If its easy to try your machine with another reg then do in case its faulty. Most likely a gas leak though as already discussed. I noticed you said that you use 0.8 tips for 0.6 wire, why? I don't think it'll cause the problem you have but you are fitting brand new tips that are effectively in worn condition compared to the wire which wont help with your welding. No, I used his reg, I think. But it does the same on my welder of I use a big bottle and normal reg or the crappy little disposables and reg. As I said before, it just welds better using 0.8 tips on 0.6 wire. I don't know why. ill have a good check of the gas supply system. |
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i've noticed on my clarke 151TE that i pull the trigger just enough to make the wire feed and "weld", but also noticed there's a tiny bit more travel in the trigger. if i make concerted effort to pull the trigger all the way home it seems to weld bettererrer. which sounds like the symptoms you are getting, but more extreme (i.e sounds like you are getting no gas)
porous does sound like no gas situation, i'd change the valve in the torch. or just the whole torch and liner
p.s i've also read about using oversized tips as a workaround to help wire feed easier, but tbh have never had any problems with matching tips to the wire (i only use .8 though)
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Last Edit: May 9, 2017 22:25:10 GMT by darrenh
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It is very 'no gas' like but everytime it happens my first check is to pull trigger to check gas feed and its always fine. So then ill try pooling more gas before feeding wire but it will still be porous. Release trigger, then press trigger again and bam, decent tack. Do another tack, lay a short bead between, all great. Move forward an inch and tack and maybe its good, maybe its porous, who knows. No telling what its going to do.
I know its not a great welder. Its been in the family for ages but not really done much work.
I wouldnt tackle a restoration with it, but for now, as a handy welder to fix the odd broken thing its fine....
Half the time.
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May 10, 2017 17:29:11 GMT
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I bought a used MIG welder (quite a small one, I forget the make/model, but it was better than the one I had) and that had similar issues that were solved by fiddling with internal connections as the first poster suggested. There wasn't anything obvious, but just undoing and doing up stuff that was accessible sorted it. If you run it without covers on perhaps dust is somewhere it should not be.
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