Scratch / Lift Start TIG Welding

[undercut]

Anyone have any experience with scratch start or lift start TIG welding? I want to know if anyone out there is actively doing it long term for actual projects and what compromises there might be doing so. Thanks.

 

[k0ua]

I am doing it with my Everlast Pa160. It works well, and the actual welding is the same. The starting takes some practice, not a big deal, and the stopping takes some practice (snap your wrist out to stop) Would HF start and a pedal to control the arc be nice?... you bet it would. Can you get done what you want done?.. You bet you can. Before all of that was invented everyone did TIG this way. Here is an example of something I repaired with Lift start Tig

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/welding/239186-am-i-stupid-crafty.html

James K0UA

 

[LD1]

I dont like it. We have a Miller at work that has both lift-arc or pedal as options. I dont like the lift arc. You have to re-grind the tungsten more often cause of contamination, and you cant vary the heat like with a pedal. Which is nice when comming to the end of a joint on thin stuff so you dont blow through. I like the pedal and set the amps higher than what I need, cause I can always back off a little with the pedal.

The only benefit I see is if welding out of position or in an awkward area where trying to control the pedal is a PITA.

 

[k0ua]

I dont like it. We have a Miller at work that has both lift-arc or pedal as options. I dont like the lift arc. You have to re-grind the tungsten more often cause of contamination, and you cant vary the heat like with a pedal. Which is nice when comming to the end of a joint on thin stuff so you dont blow through. I like the pedal and set the amps higher than what I need, cause I can always back off a little with the pedal.

The only benefit I see is if welding out of position or in an awkward area where trying to control the pedal is a PITA.

While I don't disagree with anything you said, "poor people have poor ways".. Can you do a lot of work with it? Yes. is it as good as HF start, and pedal control of the current, for all the reasons you gave.. No..Is it a good way to get started cheap into TIG, and make you lust after better machines and methods.. Yes..

James K0UA

 

[LD1]

While I don't disagree with anything you said, "poor people have poor ways".. Can you do a lot of work with it? Yes. is it as good as HF start, and pedal control of the current, for all the reasons you gave.. No..Is it a good way to get started cheap into TIG, and make you lust after better machines and methods.. Yes..

James K0UA

Yes, it is cheaper. Dont get me wrong, I'd take a scratch start over no TIG ANYDAY. Just pointing out the major dis-advantages of it IMO. But the advantage of low cost trumps the dis-advantages for most homeowner-hobbiest as you mention.

I dont have a TIG at home. TOO $$$$. If I have something to be TIGed, I just take it to work and do it there. So in my case, I cant justify even a scratch start.

 

[mrmikey]

You have to re-grind the tungsten more often cause of contamination, and you cant vary the heat like with a pedal.

Thermadyne, ( Products ) as well as other companies no doubt, make a lift arc machine with a pedal. They demoed that machine at work a coupple of weeks ago, nice unit.
Lift arc doesn't necessarily mean no pedal control. All it does is lower the amperage so there's no arc when you touch the tungsten to the base metal so there's no (technically) contamination of the tungsten. When you 'lift' the tungsten from the base metal the arc initiates.
Is it as good as a high frequency start. nope but it beats no tig....Mike

 

[k0ua]

Thermadyne, ( Products ) as well as other companies no doubt, make a lift arc machine with a pedal. They demoed that machine at work a coupple of weeks ago, nice unit.
Lift arc doesn't necessarily mean no pedal control. All it does is lower the amperage so there's no arc when you touch the tungsten to the base metal so there's no (technically) contamination of the tungsten. When you 'lift' the tungsten from the base metal the arc initiates.
Is it as good as a high frequency start. nope but it beats no tig....Mike

I think what we are doing is technically called Scratch start not Lift start, as you pointed out the Lift start machine has some "smarts" and scratch start does not. There is some contamination, but it is minor after you get better at it.. Not near as bad as dipping the tungsten in the puddle while welding and there isn't any "gizmo" that fixes that:laughing:

James K0UA

 

[mrmikey]

You could be right James. I use the two names to describe the same thing

Not near as bad as dipping the tungsten in the puddle while welding and there isn't any "gizmo" that fixes that

LOL,cursing helps, not realy it just makes you feel better :laughing: .....Mike

 

[LD1]

Not near as bad as dipping the tungsten in the puddle while welding and there isn't any "gizmo" that fixes that:laughing:

James K0UA

Thats almost as bad as touching your filler wire to the tungsten:laughing:

 

[monckywrench]

It's not bad once you get comfortable with it. We trained many students to pass 6G pipe tests in nineteen weeks. Billions of dollars of pipeline and boilers and nuke plants are welded every year that way.

 

[dstig1]

Lift and scratch start are different. Lift maintains a small voltage on the tip when the circuit is open. When you touch it to the work, it grounds the circuit and the machine detects that. When you lift it up and break the short circuit, it cranks the volts up to fire the arc (or something close to that). To my understanding it is supposed to be even better for tungsten contamination than high-freq, though I don't know why. I have only tried hi-freq briefly in a class but will probably get to do lift sometime down the road as my XMT304 has it but does not have high freq as is. Just need a torch, pedal and some argon...

Scratch start seems very much like striking an arc in stick welding.

 

[yomax4]

Yoiu can't always be working at a bench with a foot control (which is my fav.) Lift start can also be used with a hand amptrol torch hooked to a power supply that has 4T. Push the button and do your lift start, let go of the button and control the amperage. Hit the button again and it ramps down to zero. Same as a foot control if you have a quality power supply.Tungsten contaminaton is not good but you can get miles of tig welding out of a tungsten. Beats the snot out of old scratch start.

 

[undercut]

I am doing it with my Everlast Pa160. It works well, and the actual welding is the same. The starting takes some practice, not a big deal, and the stopping takes some practice (snap your wrist out to stop) Would HF start and a pedal to control the arc be nice?... you bet it would. Can you get done what you want done?.. You bet you can. Before all of that was invented everyone did TIG this way. Here is an example of something I repaired with Lift start Tig

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/welding/239186-am-i-stupid-crafty.html

James K0UA

Nice. Thanks for feedback, James!

 

[undercut]

You could be right James. I use the two names to describe the same thing

LOL,cursing helps, not realy it just makes you feel better :laughing: .....Mike

Probably my fault as I lumped the two together in my initial post. The lift start is not *supposed* to contaminate the tungsten. It is supposed to initiate a low energy arc and once the tungsten moves away from the metal it turns on the power like dstig1 stated. My bad.

Thanks for all of the comments. My appetite for trying TIG is definitely growing - just need to see if my wallet is willing to accommodate!

 

[k0ua]

Probably my fault as I lumped the two together in my initial post. The lift start is not *supposed* to contaminate the tungsten. It is supposed to initiate a low energy arc and once the tungsten moves away from the metal it turns on the power like dstig1 stated. My bad.

Thanks for all of the comments. My appetite for trying TIG is definitely growing - just need to see if my wallet is willing to accommodate!

I went down this road last year, and it does open up new vista's. Sure it is not like buying a nice dedicated TIG rig, but the most of the investment is the cylinder and regulator anyway, and you can reuse that if you ever do invest in the "real" TIG machine. It will allow you to work on smaller things with lots of control. Of course it takes lots of practice to do anything with it, but that is half the fun..be sure to get some tungsten's as you are going to be grinding a lot at first due to mistakes. I use lanthanated, (gold band) because it seems to be about as good as the thoriated (red band) but it is not radioactive. So you do not have to eat that nice radioactive dust. The actual tungsten (green band) is pretty much reserved now a days for high frequency AC welding on aluminum. In my opinion it is worth doing, and if you need some help let me know on getting the equipment going, If I can help I would be happy to.

James K0UA

 

[LD1]

I went down this road last year, and it does open up new vista's. Sure it is not like buying a nice dedicated TIG rig, but the most of the investment is the cylinder and regulator anyway, and you can reuse that if you ever do invest in the "real" TIG machine. It will allow you to work on smaller things with lots of control. Of course it takes lots of practice to do anything with it, but that is half the fun..be sure to get some tungsten's as you are going to be grinding a lot at first due to mistakes. I use lanthanated, (gold band) because it seems to be about as good as the thoriated (red band) but it is not radioactive. So you do not have to eat that nice radioactive dust. The actual tungsten (green band) is pretty much reserved now a days for high frequency AC welding on aluminum. In my opinion it is worth doing, and if you need some help let me know on getting the equipment going, If I can help I would be happy to.

James K0UA

I never used the gold band stuff. Always the red for steel/stainless and green for aluminum.

Besides being less radioactive, are there any other benefits to the gold band??

 

[deereman75]

I never used the gold band stuff. Always the red for steel/stainless and green for aluminum.

Besides being less radioactive, are there any other benefits to the gold band??

I remember weldingtipsandtricks did a video on it. He found that the 2% lan tungsten actually held up better then the red. Also, on inverter machines, just use the same tungsten for ac and dc. Only on the old school machines, did you need pure for ac. Edit: I wish you guys would stop talking about this... Making me want to spend money I dont have, for a tig rig I dont need..

 

[k0ua]

I never used the gold band stuff. Always the red for steel/stainless and green for aluminum.

Besides being less radioactive, are there any other benefits to the gold band??

None that I know of. It is just not radioactive, does not contain any Thorium. How important that really is and what real danger there is to the thoriated ones I don't really know. but there are precautions about breathing in the thorium dust when you grind them.

James K0UA

 

[undercut]

Good to know about the radiation aspect of it. As a beginner and hobbyist, the absolutely best weld will not be a priority for me as I am learning. I just hope not to blow any tungsten bits off and be able to sustain a steady arc!!

IF I get a starter TIG setup, I'll go with the lanthanated and see where that takes me.

I'm totally with deereman75. I shouldn't even be asking these questions given that I'm not sure when / if I'll be able to afford a stick welder, consumables, etc.

Thanks everyone for their input! Learning an awful lot.

 

[k0ua]

Good to know about the radiation aspect of it. As a beginner and hobbyist, the absolutely best weld will not be a priority for me as I am learning. I just hope not to blow any tungsten bits off and be able to sustain a steady arc!!

IF I get a starter TIG setup, I'll go with the lanthanated and see where that takes me.

I'm totally with deereman75. I shouldn't even be asking these questions given that I'm not sure when / if I'll be able to afford a stick welder, consumables, etc.

Thanks everyone for their input! Learning an awful lot.

My startup cost was right at 350 bucks for everything. Torch, 125Cuft cylinder full of argon, regulator and the tungstens. Gloves and some TIG rod. I did buy the cylinder, so you could get by with a rental for less up front. Of course I already had the welder the Everlast PA160

James K0UA