New to welding & don't know much about it

[PMRT]

I inherited my Dad's Sears 225 amp arc welder and large assortments of electrodes years ago. I've had about 5 minutes of instruction, and this past summer managed to weld some iron chains together by experimenting. It worked out well. Now I want to try welding a steel tail pipe to 1/8 steel plate and I'm not having much success. I've read some articles but I need more detail and cannot find a local course on arc welding. Does anyone know where I can get a tutorial (written or cd) for the beginner that's decent?

[Jetmekdc-10]

I have printed tons of great info from this site and from thefabricator.com. The internet is a buffet of information. I also bought a book on welding. I think the author is Bowditch. It's called "Modern Welding" I bought it off e-bay and have read some chapters over and over. Good Luck, Adam

[k.a.m.]

what rod are you trying to use, what amp are you running at? i guess your running ac and not dc. try a 6013 3/32 start at around 40amps work up your amps up until your comfortable good luck and let us know if it helped.