Welder World Blog

Learning to mig weld

When you’re learning to mig weld you’re going to need to cover a few basic steps first, and they are:

Welding safety Preparation Machine set up Installing mig wire Tack welds Torch postion

Like anything, safety is paramount.  You should always wear thick and heavy clothing such as overalls, a good strong pair of leather boots (preferably steel capped boots), welding gloves and a welding helmet.

When you mig weld the arc gives off ultraviolent and infrared light. This light is very damaging to your eyes and because of that you need to be protected from it with a welding helmet.

Not only is the welding arc bad for your eyes but it is very hot, so it’s a good idea to use a quality pair of leather welding gloves. The best ones that I have come across have been the ones that are Kevlar stitched.  And by the way, the day that you don’t put on your gloves will be the day that you pick up that hot bit of metal that you just welded and forgot about. Been there before.

Once you’re all geared up and ready to mig weld you need to prepare the surfaces.  Any traces of oil, paint, grease or heavy rust will have to be grinded off back to shiny metal.  This is very important in making a good weld bead.

The welding wire will need to be installed onto the machine and the correct size contact tip will need to be fitted, make sure that your welding nozzle is clean.  Also check that you’re using the correct size feed rollers for the wire.

Depending on the thickness of metal that you’re going to weld you’re either going to need more power or less power.  This will be a matter of trial and error. Once you have this sorted you’re going to make some tack welds first.

A tack weld is a small weld that is used to hold all the larger pieces of metal together.  You tack weld first so that you can check that all the parts are in the right places and everything is aligned and square.

Now once it is all tacked up and ready to go you can fully mig weld it up.  Finally when you’re learning to mig weld you need to be aware of your torch position.  If you are using a flux cord wire you will need to use the pull technique, which is like when you are stick welding and you drag backwards.  If you use a solid mig wire such as an ER70S-6 class wire with a shielding gas you can either push or pull.  Learning which style suits you best will slowly take time.

For more detailed information and photos check out this site here:  learning to mig weld