Review / feedback on the Diversion 165

[BILLYhoang]

Hello guys, I've been lurking on the forum and reading alot trying to gain knowledge and I finally joined today. I have had my Diversion 165 for about 6 months now and I'm doing okay on steel but having nightmares with aluminum.

I mainly weld on automotive parts. I've tried tig welding valve covers , aluminum piping for intercoolers and they all came out very bad. I only had one nice weld which was a cast aluminum elbow onto a turbocharger housing. ( picture below )


Can you guys give me your opinions / tips / advice / suggestions about using the Diversion 165 for tig welding on aluminum ? Any pictures of end results ?

Thanks

- Billy

[Miller Swartz]

Billy,

Besides the cast aluminum, it sounds like everything else you were welding was relatively thin (say around .090" thick). Now unfortunately you didn't describe what you meant by "came out very bad", but I'm going to take a guess and say you had a lot of melt through, is that correct? Based on the appearance of the weld on the cast aluminum elbow, it looks like you applied quite a bit of heat to that. This is fine for a peice this thick. TIG welding cast aluminum can be frustrating depending on the quality and condition of the casting, so consider that an achievement in itself. But without the mass that a thicker casting has to absorb all the heat, welding on that thinner material with the same settings can go bad in a hurry.

If you can post some pictures of the bad welds and provide us with the settings and/or describe your technique, we should be able provide you with some suggestions.

[harcosparky]

When people post wiiiiiiiiiiiiide pics I cannot read their post because the pics force the post wide and the MILLER ADS on the right side ride over top the post.

Maybe miller could remove those ads ??????

Or maybe I need a different browser!

EDIT: Even on another browser those dang AD LINKS interfere with the initial post in a thread!!

[rotty]

/\ /\ /\

I t does it to me too. I hate it.

[TripleTrophy]

One thing that springs to mind is what size of tungsten and filler are you using? For the light stuff, it may be too thick to work properly.