From the all-important step #2 of this Instructable: “Don’t Poison Gas Attack Yourself, etc.”
Useful for anyone who wants to make welds without spending much:
Welding is usually the easiest and quickest way to build something.
You just put the parts next to each other and weld them.
You don’t have to drill bolt holes and go to the hardware store for bolts.
Metal doesn’t split like wood. It doesn’t have grain and knots that make every piece different.
You can get all kinds of scrap metal for free. Bed frames, parts of old cars, etc etc.
And you can make your own welder for free or close to it.Don’t have access to a welder? LIAR!! All it takes is some junk car batteries and a welding rod.
Or some dead microwave ovens to butcher for the transformers.
Make your own industrial revolution!
12 thoughts on “Cheap welding for punks”
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This post should have a massive warning– welding is dangerous and not something people should experiment with casually. Posting that photo along with the batteries-and-a-welding-stick recipe is irresponsible.
If you click through you’ll find that the referenced Instructable is a pretty fair overview of cheap-ass welding techniques and spends some time talking about safety. I learned something I didn’t know about induced current and long welding leads.
Don’t comment on the teaser and pic, comment on the referenced material.
Has make really come to the point that it needs to put warning on potentially dangerous (okay, more than potentially) things ?
sigh….
When I lived in the Dominican Republic I saw crazier. At least this guy has something covering his face. Despite seeing welding several times on the street, with rigs of varying sophistication, I never once saw a Dominican use any sort of welding mask or eye protection. I commented once on this at a local business service office for expats and was told that they didn’t need any sort of mask, they knew what they were doing…
It would be great if you could have a welding & machine-shop special (e.g. how to work a lathe and so on). It seems older people know all these things by heart but not so much about electronics. Being somewhat younger I’m pretty familiar with the electronics and programming stuff but welding and machining is a blind spot that would be awfully useful to know a little bit more about and be able to tinker with! :)
Regarding warning/dangerous posts: I think it is perfectly reasonable and important to warn about any non-obvious dangerous aspects. A lot of harmless looking things can be pretty dangerous and I at least prefer to know about potential dangers before I start working with something. What would be wrong is if interesting projects was pulled of the press just because it could be dangerous.
Those Dominicans must have eyeballs of steal.