Help With Dynasty 200dx

[garagehermit]

I have had my welder since new for over two years and cannot do a decent weld. I get it out, read the book and try for several days and give up and put it away and get the mig welder back out. I have read several books, talked to people at Miller booth at the street rod shows and still cannot do a decent weld on aluminum or steel. I am retired and have been welding with oxy/acet and mig for years. Have used the Dynasty to do decent stick welds, but thats not what I bought the machine for.
I would like step by step help over the next few weeks, one thing at a time, and try to upload pictures of my problems. I feel like I have talked to too many of the wrong people and have some bad advice along with the good.
FIRST QUESTION: give me the basics for steel welding 1/8" or thinner. Such things as machine settings, tungsten rod and size, filler rod and anything else.
I am running out of hope and patience. May trade the machine for a new mig.
Is there anyone in the Cincinnati area that can help? I tried an adult class at the voc. school and it was a waste of time.
DESPERATE IN CINCINNATI!

[fun4now]

you might try you LWS (local welding store) or even fab shops in your area, ask if any one is willing to help you one on one get the hang of tig offer a few $$ to cover there time. some LWS give classes. odds are they will have some one that comes in that knows what they are doing. i went to a local fab shop and although he was buisy he took some time out to help teach me the basics. just watching some one do it right makes a big difference. with O/A in your background you should not have too much truble.
posting us some pictures will realy help, there are some guys on here that realy know there stuff. also most problems have tell tales so we might be able to help alot right off the bat.
steel is much easyer than aluminum so maybee start out with some SS 1/8 or steel but SS is the easyest. that will let you get the hang of puddle controle and filler adding befor trying to tackel aluminum.
clean, clean, clean is a need for TIG. the cleaner the better even a little bit of scale or rust will jump out and show its self in TIG.
first off i would get some 2% lanthanated tnugsten and a gas lense. other tungsten will work but most prefer the 2% lanthanated or cerated but i would start with lanthanated and then chose what you want to use long term after you get the hang of it.
NEVER,NEVER USE PURE TUNGSTEN !!!!!!
it is a no no in the dynasty 200 and can even cause damage to the welder.
pop us some pictures to give us a starting point.
i'm asuming with all the reading you already know strait argon is the gas needed and should be set abuot 25 for standerd torch setup and more like 15-20 for gas lense. and never grind the tung on a grinder used for any thing else, or it will leave small particals imbeded in the tung. and that will contaminate the tip right off befor you even get a puddle going.
also a biggy in aluminum is never use anything but SS wire brushes on it , steel ones will leave behind a steel powder that will kill the weld.

thease are just some basics you may already know, so shoot us some pic's so we can see where you need to go next.
and welcome to the board.

[fun4now]

BTW cool name, kinda fist a lot of us i would think.
you might try a serch on here for dyn settings thats a realy popular welder for the hobby guys as well as the pro's so there is a lot of info on it in here.

[MintSScout]

I don't live close enough to really help you person about a 2hr drive, but if you ever want to get rid of your Dynasty I'll gladly take off your hands. It will be easier for us to help if we can see some picks and if we knew what type of joints you were doing.

[millermania]

I have had my welder since new for over two years and cannot do a decent weld. I get it out, read the book and try for several days and give up and put it away and get the mig welder back out. I have read several books, talked to people at Miller booth at the street rod shows and still cannot do a decent weld on aluminum or steel. I am retired and have been welding with oxy/acet and mig for years. Have used the Dynasty to do decent stick welds, but thats not what I bought the machine for.
I would like step by step help over the next few weeks, one thing at a time, and try to upload pictures of my problems. I feel like I have talked to too many of the wrong people and have some bad advice along with the good.
FIRST QUESTION: give me the basics for steel welding 1/8" or thinner. Such things as machine settings, tungsten rod and size, filler rod and anything else.
I am running out of hope and patience. May trade the machine for a new mig.
Is there anyone in the Cincinnati area that can help? I tried an adult class at the voc. school and it was a waste of time.
DESPERATE IN CINCINNATI!

Can you post pictures of your welds?

Are you saying you can't even put down the simplest of welds with your Dynasty? Try using 1/8" steel, set the machine to 130A DC, use 3/32 tungsten (I used 1.5% lanthanated, others have been successful with ceriated and thoriated). Argon set to 15CFM. Don't even worry about using filler for now. Just get the arc going, form a puddle and try to go in a straight line and see what you get. It really is no different than torch welding.

[classj]

On 1/8th plate. Just clean it well. I would set the machine back to factory defaults to start. Then just turn it up to 125 amps or so and start. You should be able to weld well just like that.

[mister honey]

Are you an east side or west side Cincinnati Guy?

Mike