The new news 24 thread

[SiC]

I probably should make a separate thread for this new "project", but here we go anyway.

 

This is the wire feeder side.

 

The wire had a lot of resistance trying to feed it to the gun. On the reel, the wire is all jumbled about. I guess it's come unreeled at some point and someone wound it up to reuse it. I see now why you're not supposed to do that, as it makes the feeding inconsistent.

 

The gun itself was in a bit of a mess. Looks possibly like some bodging has been going on to fix things. New aftermarket guns can be had from eBay for £35, not sure how good quality they'll be, but surely can't be too much worse than this?

 

EDIT: Just realised that this has no gas feed to it, so someone must have bodged a replacement torch to it at some point. Looks like I'll need a new torch if I'm going to go gas.

 

 

I stripped it down and cleaned it up. Replaced the bodgy jubilee clip with a fresh one. Not sure how the wire would have originally been held in this, but I guess not this way?

The swan neck had no liner in it, is this normal? I have a Clarke one to fit in if necessary.

Main liner is metal, not nylon like some have reported it to be. Given the bodgery here, I reckon someone may have already changed it in its life.

 

 

Inside the main chassis. A bit dirty and full of dust & crap. I'll give it a Hoover out later.

 

The control board looks relatively uninteresting. The relay on it is pretty dirty and tired looking. Looking at the wiring it appears to control the main welding transformer (mains side, hence the small relay), which is good as it means that its probably not a live torch after all.

 

The wire feed motor definitely comes from the welding transformer. When welding, the transformer will load down and slow the feed. So you end up with a fast initial burst and then a lot slower feed in use. Apparently the opposite. I guess they did it this way for cheapness and to try to have a vague feed speed dependant on voltage.

 

Motor control is through an analogue circuit on the control board. Basically uses a transistor to dump excess power through it (hence the big heatsink on it) to slow it down. Not the best way to drive a motor and get the most torque. My plan is to disconnect that and feed it directly from a cheapy Chinese PWM controller, connected to a dedicated power supply for the motor. If I get one with a screen, I have some reference that I can calibrate wire speed to.

 

Directly powering it over 24v provided quite a feedrate. I assume that in pretty much every use, this is far too fast to be useful. However it did feed relatively smoothly, only changing when the reel unwound unevenly. I guess the liner isn't too bad a shape.

[Video]

 

Slow speed running. Pretty much as slow as I could run it.

[Video]

 

Next step is to source and mod in a motor controller. Current draw from the motor is pretty low, so pretty much anything will do the job. I'm thinking of one something like this:

https://m.ebay.co.uk/itm/DC-6-30V-12V-24V-MAX-8A-Motor-PWM-Speed-Controller-With-Digital-Display-Switch-P-/253116251484

 

Turning the knob will vary the speed I assume from 0-100%. I'm hoping that it'll be possible to linearly work out the percentage duty cycle to wire speed and then graffiti it on the front of the unit.

[cort16]

Any way to variably control the amps? On more expensive welders you have more flexibility over the power, which is handy on thin metal , which you'll be dealing with . My welder can just about do 1mm at the lowest setting without blowing lumps out of it on .6 wire.

It's also worth looking up all the things that will kill you if you try to weld them. I.e. Anything with a zinc coating .

[tooSavvy]

.... I agree >> thread: Weldershite, or some such ??

 

TS

[cobblers]

I did similar to my Aldi welder and it welded gr8 for about one day before the diode pack failed and I scrapped the lot.

 

That relay on your PCB looks pretty much fucked with most of the contacts spattered on the casing, for what they cost I'd change it if I were you.

[Guest Hooli]

Looks just like the cheap welder I had once, even a damn good welder I knew said it was shite to use. So those upgrades are needed.

[MrDuke]

How****ingmuch?/10

 

Doesn't even taste of pumpkin.

 

Also, Crewe.

 

[MrDuke]

#THUGLIFE

 

[MrDuke]

Dirty sounds:

 

[MrDuke]

 

Mostly awesome.

 

Handbrake seems to be sticking, and stereo needs a code. Otherwise pleasure.

[ruffgeezer]

I bought a car from Facebook.

 

Full report later.

 

[Guest]

Panda passed its MOT, after a set of shoes and a cylinder. 2 years now and less than 100 quid in repairs. Great wee car.

[hairnet]

I didnt go to the auction

[danthecapriman]

Repaired the guttering on my garage this morning. I went cheap when I built it and used Wicks mini guttering which has warped and bent meaning it's sagged in the middle letting it overflow down the garage wall instead of out the two down pipes at the ends. All fixed and working now but I got covered in manky water (with bird shit in it!).

 

Then decided I'd patch up the tarmac driveway where I cut a section out to fit the gutter downpipe into a drain. Filled in with some of that tarmac repair you buy in bags from diy shops. Works pretty well.

To use up the rest of the bag I dug out all the rancid dissolved tarmac from where the Mercury dumped most of its auto box oil a few years ago.

It's weird what oil does to tarmac, it'd literally dissolved it into sludgy soft gunge. Made it really easy to scoop and dig out though. Piled the rest of the repair bag into the hole and smashed it flat and level with an old fence post. Looks good and worked a treat but it's hard work lifting and slamming that fence post down constantly and I think it's given me white finger now!!

[beko1987]

I bought a car from Facebook.

 

Full report later.

 

DSC_0357.JPG

Once the aa have got you home?

[vulgalour]

Been spending today stripping off stone-effect paint in the kitchen.  Why someone thought it was a good idea to paint kitchen tiles with a textured stone-effect paint you can't clean is beyond me.  It had finally started to lift at the back of the sink so I finally had an excuse to get rid of it and all the nastiness it was holding on to.  Pleasantly surprised to find good condition, dated, 90s farmhouse* tiles underneath.

 

If you've got stupid tile paint on old fashioned tiles that have nothing wrong with them other than being old fashioned, simply dip a floor scrubbing brush in thinners, wipe onto the tiles about 3-4 at a time and then lightly scrape with an old plastic card (I used a defunct club card).  Repeat a few times and finish by scrubbing with a green pan scourer to get the grout clean.  Cheap, fairly quick, and just a little bit smelly.  Beats retiling the whole kitchen which isn't going to happen.

 

 

 

 

Next thing is to try and convince the landlord to replace the kitchen window which has a rotten frame and all three of the lower double glazing units have enough condensation inside them you can't see out.

[Guest Hooli]

I've never understood painting tiles.

[Kiltox]

I've never understood painting tiles.

Some of the properties I'm looking at buying for BTL have horrendous tiles that could be transformed with some paint for £50 or replaced for a couple of grand

[Guest Hooli]

But they just look like painted tiles, which always looks shit to me.

[vulgalour]

Doesn't matter if you don't have to live with it.  Landlords don't give a crap about that sort of thing, they just want it presentable and if it wears out while the tenant is there then generally they'll try and stiff them for the cost of replacement and not return the bond.  Luckily, our landlord is super chill about decorating providing we don't do ridiculous things like painting the ceiling black and installing astro turf indoors, and pretty good with repairs when they're needed.  It's been a surprisingly stress free couple of years here compared to other houses I've rented.  He just seems happy he's got tenants that actually give a shit about the property.  Really, the only complaints Mike and I have had with the place is what the previous tenants have done, or rather haven't done, when it comes to maintaining the grounds.  That and painting everything inside with matt paint and satin woodwork which is just impossible to keep clean.  Nearly everything is gloss woodwork and vinyl silk walls now and it's so much easier to look after as a result!

 

It's nice to be able to actually be house proud.  It's  shockingly rare thing to be able to do when you rent.

[Kiltox]

Sounds exactly like the approach I'll be taking - if you want to make it your home by decorating etc do so as long as you do a half decent job

[vulgalour]

Rental market needs more landlords like that.

[Lord Sterling]

Micra is starting to get a bit demandy now. First of all it fails it's MOT (but there are few questionable items on there) this morning it has a flat tyre and now the cigar lighter/charging point won't work. Checked the fuse, it's not that. It stopped working after I plugged in a newly bought compressor to pump up the tyre. After a few minutes it just stopped. Nothing works in the lighter/charger point now. It must be the wiring which'll be looked at next Friday when it's booked in for MOT and work again.

[Tamworthbay]

Started the Capri up for the first time in a few months. It went a treat. Unfortunately I didn't realise the wind was blowing towards the garage and bringing the fumes back in. Five minutes later I had the mother of all headaches and the carbon monoxide alarm was going mental. So opened every window for a couple of hours and all seems ok now, apart from my head. I feel a complete twat.

[Bear]

Oooosh, I did something similar today warming the Volvo for an oil change. Grim.

[3VOM]

 and stereo needs a code.

Pull the stereo out. You will be surprised at the number of stereos that have the code written on them. If it hasn't, I think you need the serial number anyway to work out the code which I think is possible with that unit, but you might have to pay for the code.

[Kiltox]

Rental market needs more landlords like that.

I rent my home too and couldn't agree more!

[nacho man]

My grandad rings

 

"Can you just have a look at my window Dan, it's stopped working"

 

Bleeding hell, google problem, Audi A4 window electric window not working, order regulator.

 

Didn't fancy it but I couldn't say no, thanks to YouTube it wasn't sooo bad.

 

 

 

Put it all back and it worked lovely apart from I couldn't get out the door forgot to clip the door catch cable back in. Bastard! Still Audi door card specialist now, so only took another 5 mins to get it off clip it back on and make sure it's all okay.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Lacquer Peel]

First frost that I've seen this season, mutha Peel has seen some already but she sometimes leaves for work before 6am.

I've seen frosts in late August here. CLIMATE CHANGE.

100% WVO and a marginal fuel filter = slight anguish, but it went okay with a little chugging.

[taxi paul]

Spent half an hour this morning looking for my teeth. Found them in the bin. Getting old is not much fun. Have looked at a galaxy and would suit my needs I think. Just debating wether to go for an older 2.0 tdcI with no dpf. In other news the xc90 I pulled out of buying got robbed from his garage in the week and was left in a mess in Runcorn. Was gutted for him. Nice bloke who works hard to earn a few quid and knobhead just take. My corolla is on eBay but no takers so far. Hopefully the celica will sell and then I may just keep hold for a whole and use it till mot time next year and then try again.

[Guest Hooli]

Spent half an hour this morning looking for my teeth. Found them in the bin.

 

Reminds me of a Steptoe and Son episode.