7018 rods
Id like to know how everybody get the 7018 rods to work....I have an old forney ac buzz box and cant get ac 7018 rod to even make a bead, ive tried all amp settings and baking the rods too. Nothing works.
I use the lincoln ac 225 welder at work and after many attempts made a bead about a 1/2 in long
heres a picture of some beads i did the other day....all the splatter you see on it is my attempt at 7018 rod
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You have to keep 7018 rods in a rod oven at 250 degrees F. 7018 can be hard to start after making a bead and stopping. The flux coats the end of the rod and you have to scrape it off to retstart the rod. I scrape them on rough steel or concrete or a file,
Old 7018 rods even after baking can be garbage. But at your skill level you should be able to make a bead. Try 120 amps with 1/8 rod and keep the arc short. Spatter with 7018 = arc too long. 7018 are called drag rod because the metal rod melts away up into the flux coating and leaves a short tube of flux that prevents the metal rod from making contact so once you establish an arc you can litteraly lay the rod on the base metal and let it walk along forming the bead. If you can't do this even with old wet 7018 it's you not the rod. 6013 rods make pretty beads but they have little penetration = don't use on a log splitter. 7010-7011 are usually first pass rods in some applications like pipe welding. Try 85-90 amps with 7010-7011 They have high penetration and good strength. Usually you weld over those with 7018 for the final passes in a multipass weld. If I have no dry 7018 and I'm making something for myself I will use 7014 rods that don't have to be in a rod oven. They run faster than 7018 but behave a lot like 7018. Over all any flux coated rod should be kept in a dry environment. Rods sitting loose on a shelf in a cold garage exposed to high humidity at times will not perform at thier best.
Rod angle, travel speed and Amperage all figure into your beads. Your beads look a little slow like you are putting down too much metal. But going too fast will undercut so will Amperage that is too high. For our concerns the most important welds on on joints exposed to cyclic stress. That's the wedge, plate, cylinder mounts etc. Undercutting on these welds creates stress risers inviting cracks to form.
Don't play around with the Amp settings too much. Each rod type and size has a range of Amperage were it will work. Get a rod amperage chart from you supplier or off the Web.
Your beads look pretty good. Sit down with a box of rods and make practice beads for an hour a day. Try different setting within the range for each type /size of rod. Try different travel speeds and rod angles. You will improve if you practice but you won't if you only weld to make a joint here and there.
Be an informed welder. Read!!
Roy