Argon reg to CO2 bottle adaptor

**Steamwhisperer** · 11th January 2015, 11:32 PM

Hi all,
Santa smiled at me this Christmas and delivered a MIG welder http://www.unimig.com.au/catalogue_p...&subcategory=2
Locally they sell the MIG gas bottles for $189 and charge $55 changeover which by all accounts is pretty good but being tighter than a fishes... I thought I would give the old CO2 a crack.
Most of the welding I am planning on is around the 3mm thick range so the CO2 should be ok.
I bought a bottle outright from ebay http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Australia.../161548151632?
Problem (and obviously a widespread one) is the Argon reg doesn't screw on to the CO2 bottle.
As it happened I had an old Oxygen bottle valve laying around which has a suitable thread for the Argon regulator so all I had to do was make an adaptor with 3/4" BSPP one end and Australian Standard type 30 the other to screw onto the bottle.
It hangs off the side of the bottle a bit but it works and it doesn't leak.
As usual I got a bit carried away and the pics in the second half didn't happen.
Pity as I used the tipped screwcutting boring bar which gives perfect thread shape. I have only had it for 4 years and never used it, now I love it.

Phil
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**RayG** · 11th January 2015, 11:51 PM

Hi Phil,

What's it like welding with pure CO2?

Ray

**Steamwhisperer** · 12th January 2015, 06:50 AM

Hi Ray,
I'm more than happy with the results, definitely hotter so I won't be doing sheetmetal too much but I haven't had much of a play yet.
I just checked the regulator and it hasn't leaked at all overnight so I'm gunna call it.

Phil

**GJM** · 13th January 2015, 04:01 PM

You can buy the adapters (at least here in New Zild) and what I did with mine is change the bullnose fitting on the regulator to the CO2 one.
CO2 certaily saves some money, and the bottles seem to last longer too.
Theoretically you have to watch out for the reg freezong - never had it happen even with some continuous welding jobs.
Geoff

**Steamwhisperer** · 18th January 2015, 07:45 AM

Originally Posted by GJM

You can buy the adapters (at least here in New Zild) and what I did with mine is change the bullnose fitting on the regulator to the CO2 one.
CO2 certaily saves some money, and the bottles seem to last longer too.
Theoretically you have to watch out for the reg freezong - never had it happen even with some continuous welding jobs.
Geoff

Hi Geoff,
sorry for the late reply, I reckon we must be able to buy the adaptors here but to be honest, I didn't look that hard. I visited the local home brew shop here after some reports on how helpful they were and I wasn't let down. He 'gave' me a brand new but faulty regulator (the nut that screws onto the CO2 bottle wouldn't screw on all the way) and this is the first time I had stepped into the shop. My plan was to do what you did and screw the inlet mount into the regulator I have but thanks to Loctite this was not going to budge. Plan 'B' was to cut the stem off and clean up the thread in the nut and machine another stem. It was about this time I remembered the old oxy bottle valve I had in the 'possibly useful' box and the rest is history.
One thing, the sealing face on the bottle had been damaged so I machined up a piece of plastic (could be Teflon) I had laying around and dropped it down the thread then crossed my fingers.
It has been about a week now and still not a bit has leaked out of the protracted pile of gear hanging off the side of the bottle that I seem to have amassed.
I'm pretty happy.

Phil

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