WELDING

Questions:

1. What is welding?
2. How many welding and joining processes are there other than soldering and brazing?
3. In your answer to question number 2, you list over 40 different welding processes.   Can you give me some general guidelines on what I should consider when selecting a welding process to make the selection process a little easier?
4. When using the oxyacetylene torch for welding and heating, the oxygen and acetylene can be adjusted to get a neutral, carburizing or oxidizing flame at the tip of the torch.   Can you describe these flames and tell me what each are used for?
5. Why are welding machines used for gas tungsten arc and shielded metal arc welding called constant current power sources?
6. I often have to perform stick electrode welding (shielded metal arc) away from my power source, and some times the welding cable length gets rather long.  Is there a rule of thumb that I can use in determining the welding cable size so that I don't get a large voltage drop and loose power?
7. I have a job specification that I'm considering bidding on.  I plan to use shielded metal arc welding because of it's versatility although it is a bit slow.  If I bought 300 lbs. of  filler metal electrode, how much of that can I expect to be deposited as weld metal considering stub loss and spatter?
8. What are some of the advantages of using a pulsed gas tungsten arc process over the conventional non- pulsed process?
9. I want to use heat to straighten a small I beam.  How do I heat the beam in order to insure it will bend the right way when it cools?
10. In resistance spot welding is it natural for the sparks to fly out from the joint?   This appears to be a fire hazard.
11. Why is it more difficult to start an arc with the gas tungsten arc process when using helium than when using argon?

to be continued