Hello Mark
Let me try to help you.
1.
First try to get a perfectly silver puddle.
Clean the metal etc. as you did before. Flush the torch with argon, because moisture goes inside the hose/torch cable and it can take even minutes to clear it away.
After this, set couple of second to your preflow and then set postflow to maximum 15 or 25 sec or whatever it is in your machine. Then light an arc on clean metal, melt a puddle and end the arc and don't remove the cup until postflow is ended. Don't put too much amperes, because we are welding stainless and it won't need that much as carbon. I would just use 50 amps no matter how thick your plate is.
Also try to make quite small puddle a size of a water drop and don't use filler. Also don't keep as long tungsten as Jody. He is doing it for the video purposes.
If you manage to get silver "spot" weld... Congratulations you have no leaks!
I you have color on your weld...... You have a leak somewhere in your system. Perhaps in torch or inside the machine or even on regulator o-ring.... or your gas lense might be broken and creates vortex..... Or you might have even a bad bottle of argon. Sometimes there is bottles that contains moisture due to problems at filling station.
Here is a Jody's good example:
Did you made this far?
2.
After getting a silver puddle it is time to focus on welding of stainless steels.
- Austenitics stainless (304,316 etc) steels needs less amperes than carbon steel, because they conducts heat poorly.
- Getting a perfect color of your weld is mainly "fashion" thing. Stainless weld can be gray and it's no problem at all.
- Keeping a filler rod inside the gas shield during welding is extremely important. Otherwise you oxidize the filler and those oxides gets in the weld, but won't melt completely.
- Try to get thinner beads. First practice withouth filler and then start adding filler when you feel comfortable. Try to use smaller rods first. This helps with the heat as you don't need to re-heat a junk of massive filler on the weld etc... Try different sizea and you will figure it out yourself.
-Markus-
PS:
Here is a orbital weld that shows a tiny bit of grey. Absolutely OK. People always tends to prefer silver and pink colors, because those are very nice looking. Truth is that in some cases it is impossible to get even pink color unless you don't want to waste argon and use trailing shield or something like that.
You said you listened to the advice but instead started playing with torch angle. Forget all the settings you are using. Turn up the amp to the max on the machine. Argon 15-20 CFH. USE THE REMOTE, that's what it's for. Setting it at 100, 160, whatever you set it at only sets the TOP limit of amperage available when the pedal or finger slide is maxed out. I can duplicate the same results you are seeing if I set my machine for 20 amps and floor the pedal and heat soak the part.
