CO2 vs C25 Shielding gas: Final tests (part 3)

[@joell439]

👍👍😎👍👍 - This was a fantastic series. Thanks for documenting your findings!

[@sebastianleicht]

Hello Greg, this was very interresting to see. I really like how you explain things and the effort you take to prove your point!

[@squib308]

I learned w/ C25, but when I bought a welder for my garage I got a CO2 bottle, and the local grow shop will swap 'em out for $10. For 25lbs of liquid CO2. I did need the little adapter you showed in another video, though.

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

Yeah, you can’t beat the price. Great thought on the grow shop to get a swap out. Better hours to get a fill up too.

[@mixpick138]

Woah! I'm fixated on the cut and etch on flat plate. Straight CO2 looks like it got 50% penetration --dang!, didn't expect that much. Problem is when I'm passing gas, errrr, using gas I'm welding super thin stuff so I need every edge I can get and go with C25 and .030 or .025 wire (I find .030 much more versatile). I know, I know, I need to learn TIG but that will have to wait. You already taught me, SMAW, gasless flux core, and GMAW and I practice a lot with those processes so your teaching has been paying off in the form of good welds but I still got a long way to go and many projects to do before I'll be ready to expand the arsenal. Thanks for another great video! P.S. While my favorite so far is stick welding, it's hard to argue with using what I call "the squirt gun" for sheer convenience and ease of use. Lol

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

Super thin material can be welded with .023 wire with mig (or even .030), I would almost argue easier than tig in some cases. Where tig really excels is welding thin to thicker material, and making short welds absolutely perfect. I need to get off my ass and do a video comparing tig to stick and mig to really show why tig is king…. Well at somethings but not everything lol.

[@mixpick138]

@@makingmistakeswithgreg Brother you put so much into this channel and content that I don't mind waiting 'till you get the time to put something together --I'll be waiting either way and doing projects (and practicing) in the meantime! 🙂

[@BCole-bj4lv]

I weld car sheet metal quite a bit. I believe most of us run .023 or 025 wire and we stitch weld 1/4" at a time or stitch weld every inch, slowly stacking them over the entire piece to avoid warping. I've tried .030 wire and it works, but .023 is way better and easier. I can't even think of using .035 or larger for such work.

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

.023 wire and a decent machine is pretty unbelievably good option on thin material. The sad thing is many people never use .023 wire to weld with on sheet metal. I did some testing with it and it literally produced welds that were the size of tig welds and very clean. The .023 is almost like a cheat code lol.

[@joeg7755]

Hey Greg, again I learned something. I find all your video series extremely beneficial. I wonder if the collection of extra spatter on the MIG nozzle is due to the fact that CO2 has a cooling effect on equipment? I think all MIG gun ratings published are with CO2? If using other gases one should derate the gun rating.

[@Mosa-166]

Very interesting! I was wondering why less penetration when using Ar. knowing that the purpose of gas is shielding. May be Argon cools the weld more than CO2!!? I don't know.

[@googlegok9637]

I guess next we will see spray with 100% argon :-) BTW that 0.7mm is kind of on the thin side . many auto body builders use the stitch technique because of warp.

[@rick076]

another great video... greg as a guy learning to weld on my trailer from both KZbin and friends, there are things that I struggle with and I dont see enough info or even helpful info in general on KZbin for what I struggle with and one of those things is overhead welding... I pretty much gave up on welding overhead with both Mig and Stick in favor of Fluxcore... my experience welding with Fluxcore overhead was very nice... I found it quite easy to weld and actually after watching one of your videos i learned why I found it easy and it was because of the fast freeze characteristic of Flux-core... now I would like to ask you question about Mig c25 vs c100... because c100 run hotter, does the weld "drop" more or does it stick more because of the extra penetration of C100? Is it easier or harder to weld overhead with c100?

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

No doubt gas shielded short circuit mig is tough to run overhead and vertical up. To a certain extent running low inductance can help (if it’s adjustable). Stick wise it takes a fair amount of time to even become functional with vertical and overhead. Flux core beats them hands down for ease of welding out of position. Pulse mig can weld uphill as easy too, but that requires an expensive welder. When it comes to co2 vs c25 out of position, I have a feeling it would be harder with co2. I didn’t run it uphill, but I can tell you that the bead tends to run more narrow and rope up a bit, which wouldn’t be a benefit running uphill. I will have to experiment a bit with it and see.

[@robert.santore]

I use 100% CO2 exclusively pretty much because that's what I started with and I've never had cause to change. But the welding I do is frame building with 1/8 or 3/16" plate, angle, and channel, so that seems like a sweet spot from the tests you've done. Are you still planning to put out a TIG series this year?

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

I have shot a couple tig videos, and I am editing them. I have my glove shootout, welder shootout, and the final 2 mig welding videos to release and then it will be multiple tig videos a week for a couple months 😀.

[@arthurmoore9488]

@@makingmistakeswithgreg Sweet! As someone who didn't know what they were doing I got myself a tig welder that doesn't support a foot pedal. I'm curious to see how f***ed I am when it comes to learning with a machine like that.

[@williamdavis4511]

We never had 75-²⁵ in boiler shop non code position until the mid nineties..

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

It works far better than I expected so I am not surprised. I wish I would have tried it a lot time ago rather than believing everything I hear about it lol.

[@Makimon02]

ОЧень интересно. Но вообще вся эта тема как с газом так и с переносом коротким замыканием или спреем должна решатся исходя из технического задания путем создания технологической карты, где будут указаны ориентировочные параметры для каждого соединения. Поэтому если запаса прочности для конструкции достаточно с проплавлением как на газовой смеси, то и нет смысла использовать СО2 На работе пользуюсь тем что привезут, и для проволоки 1.2мм(0.45 попугаев) мне проще и удобнее использовать смесь т.к. результат более стабильный. Вчера как раз пробовал добиться подобия струйного переноса на СО2, и оно получилось, но только углом вперёд и с целым фонтаном огромных капель😅 И даже этого получилось достичь только когда поставил напряжение на максимум(я не знаю какое оно в цыфрах, там шкала от 1 до 10🤪) аппарат работает от сети 380В так что проблем с запасом нет. В остальных же случаях с газом СО2 на всех режимах происходит крупно капельный перенос и соответственно во все стороны летят брызги. Но они так же напрямую зависят от положения горелки, направление движения горелки, положение шва(если он отклонен от горизонта, то желательно покрутить настройки, если не хочешь иметь дело с брызгами.) Да можно добиться шва без брызг, но на горелке всё равно их будет много. На смеси можно выставить +- одни настройки и варить в любом положении без боли и переживаний. Про вертикальные швы в чистом СО2 я вообще молчу, ты должен быть роботом что бы вести четко по краю ванны с одной скоростью, с идеально чистым металлом. Иначе проволока "споткнётся" и по факту будет дефект. Но возможно это из за "толстой" проволоки. Но и к этому можно приспособиться. Вопрос как всегда в цене и целесообразности.

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

The translation seemed to work good, I was able to understand what you wrote 😀👍. You are correct, working with proper designs and understanding the limits of the welding process being used will produce good results without the use of c02. CO2 is mostly a benefit for lower powered welders on thicker plate, which is more of a bandaid than a great solution.

[@engjds]

I feed Mig with 100% Co2, but the cart also has Argon for the Tig, my question is, is there a splitter and a good way of achieving the C25 mixture when required?

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

So technically you can blend gasses using a special regulator. The only issue is the accuracy of such a device would need to be very good. With a single gas bottle you will get a consistent mix. With multiple bottles you will possibly get a varying mix depending on tank levels and gas flow. That could change the way the machines weld. It is possible but in many cases people do that with helium where the accuracy of the flow is less critical.

[@michaelwhiting878]

Could you please repeat this test with Dual Shield wire of C25 vs C100 or any other common gas you might have at your disposal. I think most of us Homegammers are limited to 0.035, so that is what I would prefer to see, but I’m sure 0.045 would teach us the same lesson. I also noticed that there is much less of that Tan Soot with C100 and I’m curious why that is, and what causes it as TIG with argon doesn’t leave soot, so logically I would assume the C25 would leave less soot than C100, but that’s obviously not the case as you can clearly see in your last segment. Interestingly there very few if any videos or discussions I can find about soot from MIG process. Doesn’t make sense why the difference between the two. Thanks

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

I am not sure what the tan soot is. It could be silicon from the filler wire. You would think the c100 would be worse since it would be unlikely that argon would cause a reaction. The only thing I can think is that the pure co2 is simply reacting more with it which causes it to burn up and not deposit in the weld area. You’re in luck on the co2 and dual shield. I got everything setup to shoot a couple videos on that for tomorrow morning. I will be testing .035 again and .045 dual shield to see if either can achieve solid results on 1/4 in material 😀

[@michaelwhiting878]

That does make sense that it is the silicone in the er70s-6 filler wire. I wonder if the difference is because the C100 burns hotter in a more aggressive arc, and vaporize the silicone better and causes it fly away into the air rather than settling on the surrounding metal kind of like hotter steam is less likely to condense on a cooler surface. I once heard it may have something to do with a chemical reaction with Nitrogen from the atmosphere, but I’m am probably wrong. Perhaps a viewer may know the answer. To me, my gut reaction/instinct is that my cover gas is not doing its job for some reason, so I turn it up a bit, but that usually has no affect on the amount of Tan Soot, or there is something alloyed into the wire that causes it. It’s an interesting phenomenon that is almost never talked much about or explained in any video or written materials I am aware of. I’m excited for your upcoming Dual Shield work, as I’m sure others are. I found a 2 pound spool on Amazon, but before I buy anything like the CO2 adapter or get a tank, I want to see your video, and see what wire and cover gas does the best job. I have seen a few videos from a channel called “On Fire Welding”, who uses a Miller Multimatic 220 (the big brother to the 215 - which supposedly is the same identical MIG engine as the 220), and he runs a LOT of dual shield on really heavy equipment like CAT earth moving equipment repairs, and he exclusively uses C25 which blew me away. I asked him, and he says the Miler 215/220 can run up to 0.045 DS wire without a problem. Unless there is some big reason why 0.035 (verses 0.045) is not a good choice in the 215, I think I would like to run the 0.035 because it think it is more within the capacity of the 215. I feel like the 215 would better represent the average Homegammers welder in the 200 amp or less class of machines running on 240v. I sent you the info on the dual shield wire I found, which will help save people from having to buy a 10 pound spool. I’m also really looking forward to the welding glove shootout as my gloves are in serious need of replacement, because they are tight on my hands and the leather has thinned enough that I keep burning myself from radiant heat. Thanks again for sharing your knowledge and challenging certain assumptions that we have all believed were true along the way like Push vs Pull or CO2 causing more spatter. You inspire me, and I’m sure many others to be better safer welder.

[@dennisyoung4631]

CO2 is an “active” gas, as in the arc breaks it down? More reducing, compared to the inertness of Argon???

[@melgross]

For me, at least, 0.035 on sheet is a nightmare. I can’t get the settings right. 0.030 isn’t too bad and I’m too lazy to change the gun for the one with the 0.024 I set up,but have used only once. Fortunately, I almost never weld thin sheet except for stainless with TIG.

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

No doubt .035 on thin is tough. The wire feed is so low that if there is even a remote change in feed speed it’s an instant hole lol. .023 is the way to go, but changing the liner on my welder is not worth it. Tig is the way to go for thin material and as long as I have that I won’t setup a wire machine for .024.

[@anicekevorking3753]

Hotdogs first comment! This will definitely be interesting. I love these videos

[@eduardosampoia5480]

Who welds 22 gauge realistically...you could have used 16 gauge instead

[@makingmistakeswithgreg]

If 100% co2 will weld 22ga then 16ga would only be easier in every respect. So the myth 100% co2 can’t weld thin material is mostly busted. It is a bit tougher than c25, but if could do it with .035 on 22ga anyone should be able to do thicker material with thinner wire with zero issues.

[@melgross]

Car guys do.

[@dennisyoung4631]

When I bought the MIG welder (h-h 190) my thought was “90+% of the time will be 12 to 20 gauge mild steel.” Hence, 75-25 gas, and .023 solid wire to start. (That, and the KZbin fellow I was watching a lot back then “recommended” such…)

[@eduardosampoia5480]

@makingmistakeswithgreg I understand ...but it's a known fact...you can't weld a successful continuous bead with mig with either either gas...it was pretty pointless to use 22 gauge...more realistic would have been 16 or 14 gauge

[@eduardosampoia5480]

@melgross usually tacks not continuous welds and it's usually 19 or 18 gauge....22 gauge is absurdly ridiculous