Hello

I need to do some welding on the Fire Engine and need to get a welder. But having never done welding no idea what type/power of welder to find. I need to fix:

- Brake adjuster screws, so a small weld to fix the shaft of the screw to the toothed wheel.

- Cab floor. Weld panels over the hole

This is all small welds, it's not holding anything of any weight and its all thin-ish material, no heavy duty stuff.

Any help would be appreciated, or any recommendations (web addresses for units would be great )

Cheers,

Kev

If you have never welded before I would strongly recommend not doing it yourself. With thin material it would be too easy to mess it up and cause more damage. If it is just lightweight stuff then doubt an experienced welder would not charge very much, or take them very long.

Avoiding damage is preferable to having a go and blowing the cab floor off

I agree with Gjlb, it takes a lot of practice to learn the techniques for welding the sort of thin gauge steels used in car panels. It's very easy for a novice to just end up blowing holes in the material... however some cheap mig welders from places like machine mart can be got quite cheap if you want to have a go.. Would recommend getting hold of some offcuts of steel scrap to practice with before letting yourself loose with it though...

Avoid the no-gass machines that use flux core wire, the wire is too thick for working thin panels and it's easier to get a decent weld using proper shielding gas and the disposable bottles are only about £10 anyway... and the most important thing is to get a proper face shield, recommend getting a arc activated solar powered one

If you can get on a night school class at a local collage.

You can pick up plenty of cheap mig welders but dont get an arc welder as they are for the experienced only.

I went for a Clarke Gasless mig and have had no problem on any gauge steel and it has had plenty of use.

These are better if you are welding outside in strong winds.

The other advantage of the gasless one I got is that it can be used with gas if I want to.

Practice is the only way to go.

If you get a cheap one then get some cheap body panels from the scrappy or ebay and have a go.

Am I reading this correctly? You are proposing to weld the slack adjusters on the brakes!! :eek:

Please tell us where and when you're taking the pump on each trip so we can arrange to be elsewhere!

I do abit of welding and it does take practice, i'd advise getting a proffesional in if you havent done it before.

As a coded welder , I would not buy a cheap M.i.G welding sets have tried doing welding jobs for people who have bought them and believe me they are pretty poor, for decent M.I.G you need a set where the wire is pulled by a unit in the welding head,as well as the wire feeder . when i did do welding on cars I welded them using a arc welder(MAA) and 16 swg welding rods, not a job for the inexperienced. Shop around and get the job done professionally, be careful there are lot of cowboys out there with a cheap a MIG set calling them selves welders doing crap work for silly money.

Give it a go mate. Welding is huge fun, but very difficult to get the hang of. Its a bit of skill to do it right no doubt.

And once you have a welder you can do allsorts. Ive made rad brakets (car), fitted new sills(car), fixed the bed (house, pregnant woman = broken furniture) and had tons of fun just welding random bits of metal together and only had it a month or so.

J