Thread: How difficult is self taught Welding?

It depends.

If your thinking of an oxy bottle rental is expensive. You can burn yourself although most people are smart enough to avoid that. Seeing the flame with the naked eye won't blind you but it's not a great idea to look on for a long time. Bottles full of pressurised gas, one of which is highly flammable obviously brings a risk.

If your considering electric welding stick welders are cheap and consumbales are too. Gassless mig is rather dearer and gas mig you get expensive bottle rental or the little cans of argon get dear if you do much of it. TIG presents similar problems. With all electric welding striking an arc with the naked eye can do permanent damage. No good. They used to make us weld with bare hands and of course the sparks burn. I wear leather gloves now. Your less likely to burn yourself and electricution is not easy either.

Then there is the weld. If it matters then it could be dangerous. Producing a structurally sound weld isn't obvious with any system. If it's just tacking something together it probably doesn't matter, but if it breaking could damage someone you probably need to learn properly.

So with all that in mind I'd say get a $99 stick welder and have some fun. Provided you take basic safety steps and maybe do some reading you'll do fine and maybe have some fun. TAFE used to run short courses if your able to get to one of those. Just be mindful that like all these hobbies there are dangers and that welding is a trade in itself for good reason. There IS a lot to it. I'm a mechanic by trade so I muddle through but I know enough to know how much I don't know what I can and can't get away with.

2c.

You could compare it to "self taught sex"

You get the books , read about it , look at the pictures ,watch the videos , but , nothing beats getting in there and giving it a go.

That has to be one of the funniest (while still being helpfull) reposnes that I have read in a while.

Originally Posted by tytower

You could compare it to "self taught sex"

You get the books , read about it , look at the pictures ,watch the videos , but , nothing beats getting in there and giving it a go.

Nice. And as Vernon said, helpful.

I've been teaching welding for a number of years, and there is only one real way to learn...as said above! Get into it, practice practice practice. In that respect everyone is self taught!

Cheers

Star,

You can have a play with a welder (stick) here next Saturday at the GTG.

Ray

Originally Posted by tytower

You could compare it to "self taught sex"
.

Or even self-taut sex.

ie there is no point in getting into a knot over it.

Spend $100 on an arc welder, get an auto darkening helmet at $69 (which will make the learning experience a lot easier), and watch some welding videos on the internet, and read some instructional sites on the internet and Bob's you uncle.


Which reminds me, Bob the welder sells good cheap welding rods that most likely will be delivered to your your door in two days. http://www.bobthewelder.com.au

When you say that you do not have much welding to do, once you start enjoying it, it gets infectious. I only started welding with a $100 welder earlier this calendar year. Here is my latest project made up of a welded frame of galvanised RHS and sheeted in Colorbond steel. It is not quite finished yet as I still need to add some hardware to the doors which I will do when the rain stops. It is a garden tools cabinet to keep all of my gardening tools in and close to where they get used rather than in my shed which is on the wrong side of the house for gardening. It will also allow me to keep the entrance to my shed clear as I would normally just shove shovels and rakes etc inside the door of the shed untidily.

I did not know that I needed one of these until I started having some fun with my welder.

Whenever I make a messy weld, I just grind it off with my angle grinder and redo it. The professionals will shudder at that but it works for me. Concerns about "heat affected zones" and all of that technical stuff are not likely to be too relevant to the sort of mild steel backyard stuff that I do.


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch


Click for full size - Uploaded with plasq's Skitch

To teach yourself to lay down a passable weld should not be difficult. To understand what makes a really good weld, and the finer points of welding would I think necessitate some tuition. If all you want to do though is stick steel together, then i say go for it.

I did a welding course at the Parramatta college $100 plus materials

couple of hours a week for 10 weeks

look in you local paper , or google to find your local school

Originally Posted by ratchet

I did a weding course at the Parramatta college $100 plus materials

couple of hours a week for 10 weeks

look in you local paper , or google to find your local school

And did you "wed" at the end of the course?

Originally Posted by tytower

You could compare it to "self taught sex"

You get the books , read about it , look at the pictures ,watch the videos , but , nothing beats getting in there and giving it a go.

Bugger - I'm such a slow reader I'm still tryin' to get through the book . . .

BTW - Everything we do is 'self-taught', good teachers make sure of it . . .

And DIY welding is possible for most people to learn - just set achievable goals and read a lot of what Grahame Collins and others say on this site . . .

Went the Tafe route myself. Couldn't recommend it more. Opened my eyes to the potential benefits plus hazards of course. The tuition is excellent, great value. I find Oxy harder than stick, would love to get a stick welder for home, thats for sure.

Originally Posted by tytower

You could compare it to "self taught sex"

You get the books , read about it , look at the pictures ,watch the videos , but , nothing beats getting in there and giving it a go.

Well, of all the suggestions, I have decided to give this one a trial first. " THE VIRGIN WELDER "

Bought all the gear today, and will be attacking my first bit of steel on the weekend. I hope I do not screw it. looks like it might be a win win no matter what the outcome.

if ya want a few pointers ill be on the coast this weekend doing nothing.