Stick Welding with an Old Clapped-Out Buzz Box

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This week’s vid is on stick welding lap joints.

For some of the joints, I am using an old lincoln tombstone buzz box welder. I call it old, but it’s only around 20 years young.

But it has been through a flood where it stayed completely underwater for quite a while.

When things dried up, it was never even taken apart to completely dry out.

A few years later, I fired it up and it worked fine. I don’t even want to know what it looks like inside.

So back to the task at hand… lap joints in 11 ga steel ( thats 1/8″ or 3.2 mm thick).

For the first joint, a DC stick welder was used and set to DCEP and 105 amps.

A 1/8″ 6013 rod burned pretty good and layed down a decent bead.

Then I turned up the amperage to 115 amps and it ran a bit better.

Did you see the puddle? For me, it’s kinda hard to distinguish what is slag in a 6013 puddle. That’s one reason why I hardly ever use 6013 rods.

But one thing that has usually worked for me when I have to use a 6013 is to make sure the amperage is set to the high end of the range.

That way the arc force drives the slag to the back of the bus. Keeping a tight arc with enough amperage are the keys for 6013 welding.

Another lap joint was done using a 7018ac rod and using the Lincoln AC welder set to 105 amps. 7018 rods are not made for AC welding but the 7018AC rod is.

For DC welding, the lincoln excalibur 7018 is a sweet rod and if amperage and technique are right, the slag peels off without any effort.

For welding lap joints like this 11 ga, it’s sometimes better to weld downhill if the joint is vertical.

For welding 11 ga lap joints downhill, 6011 electrodes are nice. I welded a few using 120 amps and that buzz box.

The 6013 welds came out pretty ok today, so you might be wondering why I don’t like them. So, here are a few reasons I have never warmed up to using 6013 rods.

After learning to weld with 6013 rods in welding school, I never saw them again on any job I worked. Literally zero code welding is done using 6013 rods.

That leads me to believe there are better rods to choose from.

So for DC welding, I prefer 7018 rods, and for AC buzz box welding, I prefer 6011 rods. They do lay down an uglier weld with rougher ripples, but they’re much more versatile for me because they do a good job downhill as well as uphill.

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