ER 7s2 or ER 7s6 for TIG welding carbon steel which one's better I think it depends on what
you're doing and we'll talk about that and show some examples and then we'll throw in a
little ringer at the end let's do it this is 11 gauge hot rolled steel here with the mill scale
cleaned we're going to compare er7 S2 to S6 to er309 I'll be using the prime weld TIG 225 today
set at 109 amps full pedal the way that I usually weld I usually set my amperage on the machine a
bit hotter than what I know I'm going to need then I'll just work the foot pedal by reading
the puddle and go from there and I don't always know what amperage I'm using but for these videos
I like to try to dial it in and know exactly what amperage I'm using so that I can list it
I feel like it helps some people so for this video I set it on 100 9 amps and I went full
pedal this is the standard cup that came with the torch I like stubby Hardware I think we've
got the absolute best stubby gas lens kit on the market because we include these furic gas lenses
where you can use Clear cups or ceramic cups and you can build on this kit without having to
buy new furic adapter kits a number seven cup is about right for this joint 20 cfh is plenty I've
got my stick out just a little bit longer than it really needs to be but I don't want the cup
to block the arc shot this is er 7s2 first here no big surprises here this is kind of the bread
andb butter Rod I use this for years and years on steel and chrom Al I like it it's relatively cheap
it's readily available not much of a reason not to use it it seems to really kind of stick where
you put it and so it's not as fluid as the er7 S6 but that's not always a bad thing especially
on on a fillet weld like this you don't want that puddle just wandering flowing all around you do
want it to wet in it looks like that did pretty okay we're going to compare the ER 7s6 in just a
second here's a 30 second tip for you though you notice how that filler Rod is just balling up and
blobbing into the puddle that's because I'm using way too long of an arc I'm using 160 amps here on
quarter inch steel and the only difference I did was I tighten the Arc Length up look how much
better it's going right there a tight Arc really helps okay now back to the comparison this is the
er70 S6 rod for mig welding the manufacturers say that S6 works better on dirtier steels for TIG
welding I haven't noticed a lot of difference it's a little bit more fluid but once things
settle down right here it it pretty much welds like the S2 in this application over nice clean
steel again the difference are subtle I can kind of notice when I dip rod in that the puddle kind
of flows out just a little bit better a little easier but sometimes you want that sometimes you
don't either way it's flowing into the root like it should and it's doing a pretty good job and
it looks really almost identical to the er70 S2 not much difference that I can tell I've got my
postf flow gas set on about 10 seconds so I'm in the habit of just hovering over that end of the
weld while that post flow times out and those are the settings I used on a t joint like this
the differences in S2 and S6 are very subtle but where they really seem to be a difference
is in an open Root situation where the backside is exposed to Atmosphere the fluidity of that S6
seems to really make a difference on open Roots there's quite a bit of difference in er7 S2 and
S6 on an open route and you'll notice that if you have a little bit too tight of a gap or something
like that the S6 will go in there or sometimes the S2 just won't penetrate won't break the walls down
so there's there's some subtle differences and I notice more of a difference on open Roots than
anywhere else well let's go ahead and finish this up and weld the last couple of inches for this
last weld we're going to use 309 that's a whole different animal 309 is used mostly for welding
stainless to carbon steel especially in pipe welding but it's a very useful rod for a lot
of other things it's useful for when you don't know the exact composition of the steel you're
doing like when you're modifying a wrench things like that but where I found it really helpful
over the years I've had to do a lot of repairs on things like injection molds and so a lot of
times they'd have rubber or plastic impregnated in some little crack or seam and if you lit up on it
with with a steel rod like S2 or S6 it would bubble and you get paracity and you have to
check chase that paracity out with a die grinder I just found that 309 worked great for those type
of repairs I wouldn't use it indiscriminately on carbon steel as a crutch necessarily but it sure
does work still at 109 amps full pedal I'm using 11/16th diameter on all these welds that's 1.6 mm
and this is 11 gauge hot rolled steel with the mill scale ground off clean this actually looks
a little bit more like that er70s six puddle than the S2 but I'm doing the same thing I'm using the
same heat I think I'm going just a little bit faster here because the 309 has just a slightly
lower melt Point than than carbon steel and so you know you don't really need quite as much heat
usually I could have bumped it down 5 or 10 amps and been fine but again at last little bit doesn't
look tremendously different than the first two sections I probably made some adjustments along
the way without even realizing it Hey listen I support these videos with my online store
at weldmonger.com we' got filler metal in stock if you're curious about trying some Er 7s6 309
or 312 thanks for watching I'd appreciate it if you visit my store weldmonger.com see you next
time