I love my Lincoln HD100

I've been doing body work as a hobby for many years, always used an acetylene torch to weld patches in where needed. about a year ago I finally convinced the wife I needed a welder. couldn't get a big one as I do not have 220 avaiable.

Last night I decided to try it out on a patch. there is an area in the top of my Kelly hard top that was "repaired" by the PO. there were 4-5 randomly sized and placed holes in a 3" square area he didn't want any more. (repaired in this case means stoving the whole area in about half an inch with a ball peen hammer and filling with 4 spatula's worth of Bondo). looked ok from the outside, but from the drivers seat there was this huge bulge of twisted wrechage rusting away right above my head.

for those who have never tried a torch on sheet metal, you can turn a flat area into the shape of a potato chip in moments with too much heat.
(Kelly top: lots of flat metal+torch=maximum warpage)

I spent about an hour cutting out to good metal and trimming up a patch. took a few tries to get the spot weld technique down, but I wound up with a patch that is truly flush with the panel, no warpage, a bit of grinding and skin coat of filler and I will be proud to look at either the inside or the outside. :stout:

Sorry no pics yet

 

sounds great. i wish you could have shown me how to do bodywork before i went and warped the heck out of my rockers.

 

a series of interconnecting, quick spot welds....no heat warpage.

 

tried that. guess the heat was too hot and i moved too quick.

 

space your spots out, and let cool or cool with a rag in between. I was using the A heat setting, 3 wire speed, hold as steady as possible and pull trigger for about 1 second. leaves a nice spot, will fill a gap of about .035 and doesn't blow holes through 18Ga sheet. must have a good ground to the sheet and no rust in the area.