I'm not sure if I missed where I can post this other than here? being I'm welding a backhoe I figured its okay? I have a 310c John Deere and will be ARC stick welding the cracks on the loader and hoe buckets, as well as doing some custom repair patch work on the loader bucket only. As far as the machine it self it's as solid as can be, no other cracks anywhere at all, just the typical front and rear buckets need welding and repairs. The issue I have is I need help in choosing the correct welding rod"s". I'm not sure what kind of metal/steel the buckets are made of, because when looking at the welding rods I see they call out rods for "Low Alloy" "Mild Steel" "Low Hydrogen". I'd appreciate hearing from anybody. thanks... Joe I WANTED TO CUT AND PASTE BELOW THIS INFO I FOUND THAT I THOUGHT WAS HELPFUL BEING IT TALKS ABOUT THE KINDS OF METALS I MENTIONED. ALSO, IF SOMEONE WANTED TECHNICAL SPECS ON METALS AND STEEL APPLICATIONS. Low alloy steel is gener-ally defined as having a 1.5% to 5% total alloy content. Common alloying elements aremanganese, silicon, chromium, nickel, molybdenum, and vanadium. Low alloy steels may contain as many as four or five of these alloys in varying amounts.1.2.2.1 Low alloy steels have higher tensile and yield strengths than mild steel or carbon structural steel. Since they have high strength-to-weight ratios, they reduce dead weight in railroad cars, truck frames, heavy equipment, etc.1.2.2.2. Ordinary carbon steels, that exhibit brittleness at low temperatures, are unreliable in critical applications. Therefore, low alloy steels with nickel additions are often used for low temperature situations.1.2.2.3. Steels lose much of their strength at high temperatures. To provide for this loss of strength at elevated temperatures, small amounts of chromium or molybdenum areadded.1.2.3 High Alloy Steel - This group of expensive and specialized steels contain alloylevels in excess of 10%, giving them outstanding properties.1.2.3.1. Austenitic manganese steel contains high carbon and manganese levels, that give it two exceptional qualities, the ability to harden while undergoing cold work and great toughness. The term austenitic refers to the crystalline structure of these steels.1.2.3.2. Stainless steels are high alloy steels that have the ability to resist corrosion. This characteristic is mainly due to the high chromium content, i.e., 10% or greater. Nickel isalso used in substantial quantities in some stainless steels.1.2.3.3. Tool steels are used for cutting and forming operations. They are high quality steels used in making tools, punches, forming dies, extruding dies, forgings and so forth. Depending upon their properties and usage, they are sometimes referred to as waterhardening, shock resisting, oil hardening, air hardening, and hot work tool steel.1.2.3.4. Because of the high levels of alloying elements, special care and practices arerequired when welding high alloy steels.
I don't know if the cutting edges approach low alloy or not, but it really doesn't matter to you and me. Forget all that technical stuff and weld with the rod you can use best. Most importantly, take the buckets off the hoe so you don't burn out your alternator, or at least make sure you have a good ground close to the welding and disconnect the battery cables. For welding on the cutting edge you might want to preheat and look a little more into technique. The rest of the bucket can be welded however is easiest.
I have welded buckets from 12" backhoe to 84" trackhoe many times and gotten very good results with 7018s. If you look around the net or talk to people, you will hear and see a lot about welding cutting edges. I have welded cutting edges many, many times with 7018 with no problems. BTW, 7018 is a low hydrogen rod.
Jfyi: Low hydrogen welding is super tough. It is tougher to run a bead (unless you're a good welder), but it is also super strong.
remember its not just welding, grinding the crack and filling in with the welder will be much more effective than just welding on top of the cracks
Oh, and one more thing, make sure your ground clamp is on the bucket itself. Otherwise you are passing current through the pins, bushings, cylinders and etc. If there isn't a tight fit, you can actually get an arc between the pin and bushing.
Hey mitch504: I'm agreeing with you on using 7018 welding rod. The place I work has shotblast machines. We are constantly welding holes closed on the cabinets. The 7018 rod works pretty good for welding on the mild steel parts of the cabinet, but the rod also allows you weld on the manganese liner. We do have special rod for welding manganese, but in a pinch the 7018 seems to work pretty good.
Thanks everybody! I appreciate all the information. It didn't cross my mind I can blow out electrical with welding current flow. I'm going to post pictures in time when I begin really working on it in a few months, it's getting colder here and I have no garage, so working on it is going to stop soon. I need to grind out a V on the crack thats on the 90º edge where the hoe bucket curves. I'm looking forward to tips and techniques on doing that. But the challenge for me will be the loader bucket on how I should repair the bottom that contacts the dirt (pictures will follow in time), over all the entire loader bucket is in fairly decent shape, the forward leading cutting edge is in great shape, its a thick heavy flat bar straight as can be bolted into place, very thick and solid. It's the underside of the loader bucket that's pitted with rust that touches the soil, made the metal thinner over time in places, I took an ice pick to it, and over all it's still solid, in okay shape, but was able to poke a BB size hole in one place, and I can see through another small BB size hole in another place, but not all of the bucket floor is as bad as other parts. then there is a crack going across side to side, about a foot or two long. Then, the rear leading edge of the loader bucket floor is dented up and cracked having pulled away a little from the bucket floor, thats from going forward and backwards while back blading with the rear leading edge of the loader bucket. Under the floor of the loader I was thinking about welding bead after bead next to each other to build up the material again, then grind smooth. Or if real bad in places maybe should section in panels in the worse places? I'm sure pictures will help everyone get a handle on whats going on, so I'm looking forward to hearing from everyone on how they would do this, thanks again everyone. Joe
If you have never welded 7018 then find some scrap metal plates around the same thickness as your bucket, practice, practice and more practice until you can situate a decent bead at decent heat. Welding with 7018 can be miserable if you go at it like you're burning 6013 or drag rods. Also needs to be reasonable clean of rust, mill finish and dirt for these rods to not slag up so bad.
Good to know, thanks... I have a 10 lb. box of 6013 coming and a back yard of some scrap metal to practice on...., I guess I really should get some 7018 as well now that you mention it. You mentioned the metal needs to be rust free when using welding rod 7018, I didn't read that, so I guess I'll need to get a better look at the rusted pits on the underside of the loader bucket bottom, then post back.
nothing has to be but the cleaner the start the cleaner the finished product
I'd be using 6011 (or 6010 if you have DC), it's easy to weld with, good penetration so you can skip the grinding, and tolerates rust and dirt. I'd either take all the bottom out and patch the whole bottom, or just weld up the cracks and live with it. I'd have to see it, but I doubt it would be worth it to patch in little panels. If it's really small thin spots, you can build it up like that, 6013 would work smooth for that. Don't bother grinding it smooth, it's not a restoration is it? Better welders will say you have to grind out the cracks, but you'll be fine if you turn up the amps and weld it hot with 6011 from both sides, it's not like a production machine that's going to be back next month for another rebuild, it mostly rusted out after all.
It's not a total restoration so I'm pretty sure I'll do what you said with welding it up, build it up.... The backhoe is in decent shape, well worth the 16k I paid for it 5 years ago, its the same machine in the icon picture that shows up in my posts. I also spent another 4k on it over the last few years on major parts and major mechanical items. This hoe seem to be in huge demand where I am in CT., while I was looking for a backhoe I must have looked at 15 to 20 units before I bought this one, I ended up spending more than I wanted to, because anything priced at 13k and lower was ready for the scrap pile, pure junk that you would only keep around to have when you needed a backhoe once in a while like two or three times a year. So I hate to see the backhoe not be kept up, and would like the repairs to look good. I agree like you said to weld up the cracks and build up, I think thats right on the mark for this loader bucket. I found a well used Montgomery WARD 250 AMP AC/DC ARC Welder for $90.00 two years ago. I didn't have the 220v service back then to test it, but now I just installed it this month so I hope the unit works good, it does turn on and sounds respectable, and I did get a spark out of it. As soon as my new equipment comes in I'll know more. I hear a lot of people prefer DC welding for many reasons that sound good to me, so thats what I'll also use.
Mild steel rods do weld easier but the welds won't last on high abrasion points and as stated are mild steel not alloy so have poor strength for flex or pressure. If you are using 6013, it should hold but you will be back into the weld stage quicker than if use low hydrogen 7018. 7018 welds better on DC and reverse polarity, better penetration, higher heat, stronger material. Weld overlays with hard face rods will help with abrasive wear but you need a decent base. http://www.esabna.com/EUWeb/AWTC/Lesson3_15.htm
If my memory is any good it seems that Hobart makes an E 7018 AC rod that works well with DC or AC. It's much easier to run than a regular DC 7018 rod. Another good rod for buildup is E 7014 as it can be run in all positions with a higher deposition rate than E 6013.
I just read that using the 7018 rod the welds are more resistant to rusting.... so that was nice to have found out.
Thanks I'll look for that 7018 rod by Hobart.... I'm yet to read up some more on this..., but I wonder if "all" the 7018 welding rods out there are all made with the same standard from company to company? such as the carbon to steel ratio that makes it the harder rod. If memory serves me right I believe the more carbon added to the steel makes it harder/brittle. I appreciate all the feed back from everyone!
I wouldn't take the bucket off to protect the alternator. If you are worried about damaging it with the welder, just unhook the wires. I have welded buckets on machines many times and haven't yet damaged an alternator that was hooked up. Maybe I have just been lucky. But always clamp the ground cable to the bucket.
Have you guys tried Arctec 223 rod? It's great. I don't know availability in the U.S. but if you can find it, give it a shot, and guaranteed you will switch.
I'm not set up to knock around a loader bucket of that size off the machine, wish I was but I'll just watch out like what Mitch504 said to look out for the arc between the bushings. I would figure keeping the ground very close to the work should do it?
That rod looks like it comes from a Canadian based company with Four locations through out Canada. I didn't look if there are any distributors in the USA, chances are they might not be able to distribute in the USA. I seen that before like with Banks, where this one bank called People's Bank can't open their branch in the next county over, here in the USA.
You should use 7018 to weld buckets, unless you know you have higher tensile strength, high carbon steel which would need a higher strength rod such as 8018 or possibly 10018. The 7018 rod is low hydrogen which means it must be kept in original sealed packaging or kept warm for storage after opening the package. The low hydrogen means it will prevent a common source of cracking which is caused by hydrogen released from any moisture by the arc which causes under bead cracking. This becomes important when welding medium to high carbon steels, alloy steels and high tensile low carbon steels (ie T1). Low hydrogen rods make much tougher welds which are also stronger at low temperatures than other rods. 7018 is an iron powder rod, as is 7014 which deposits metal at about the same rate as the next size of non iron powder rod such as 6013, 6011 and 6010. Almost all professional stick welding on buckets is done with low hydrogen rods with 7018 being the majority of that. You may have to preheat your bucket before welding. You can also post your welding questions over at www.weldingweb.com
Go with the 7018. Its not a bad rod to burn and you will get get a good solid weld. Grind out your cracks for sure or you will be redoing the job. You need lots of penetration. If you want to keep the machine in top shape don't cut corners by not grinding and using 6011 or 13. it will work but you are are going to redo it later on. Grind and use 7018 and you never touch it again. I did mine last year on my old 410C. I put a whole new plate on the bottom of the front bucket. I use 1/8" 7018 for the root pass and capped it all with 5/32" 7018. It took me 12hrs to do the job but it was done right. Don't weld to much in the same area just burn one rod and move over a couple feet so you don't warp the bucket by excessive heat in one spot move around to spread the heat .
Thanks norite for the heads up on everything, and for the welding web site. I did some reading on pre-heating like you mention. It was some good info to know about how having the bucket preheated when done properly avoids the microscopic cracks that happen because of the temperature differences of the welding bead and the steel your welding being cold. It makes sense now when I use to see welds break along side the weld and not the weld it self even when there was enough penitration. My next question I'll ask at that web site would be what temp to heat-up the bucket to, perhaps 200º (guessing). I do have a magnetic temperature gauge I use for the pellet stove that should work on what I heat the bucket up to. ~Joe
Thanks Harry for the information, I see what you mean about wanting to distribute the welds and not concentrate the heat in one spot. I'm glad you mentioned it because I just learned that exact lesson while practicing welding a re-bar to angle iron. I began seeing such an obvious bend in a 2 foot section of the angle iron and rebar being welded together, even tho I was spacing out the two inch tac welds I was still concentrating in a few places where I was loading up with welds making it glow red hot in a few places that most likely caused it to bend and put a bad curve in what was once a straight 2 foot section. I would have been very upset if this happened to the bucket. I'd like to find a junk bucket to practice on.
No way to know the preheat temp req'd, if any, the manf. of the bucket you have will be able to give you spec.s on what steel was used to fab your bucket and will have a recommended welding procedure. That is the official answer. In general if you don't know what you have, any preheat will be beneficial and won't harm anything if not req'd, especially if welding outside at this time of year. 200 deg sounds pretty good to me. Once you start welding, you want to maintain an interpass temperature which the welding usually provides if done continually. Finally some post heat may be beneficial, you want the bucket to cool as slowly as possible. You can buy "temp sticks" which melt at specific temperatures to show you what temp you are at.
For welding outside I'd preheat enough that any moisture would evaporate. .200+ would be a good temp. Most buckets are mostly made from mild steel but welded on cutting edges are usually a higher carbon steel needing either a low hydrogen rod (E 7018-8018) or gas shielded wire welding. Weld prep and cleanliness are fairly important in all welding processes. If you have some old fiberglass insulation around it might not be a bad idea to wrap the weld area with that after you've finished welding, especially if you're doing this outside in close to or below freezing temps. This would allow the weld(s) to cool a bit more slowly
I think I'll do this repair come Spring into the Summer, and even at that time I'll still heat the bucket because it looks like a Win Win situation that I can't go wrong with doing to heat it up.
7018 all the way if you can open a box and keep it in a rod oven. May be mentioned elsewhere but low hydrogen rods suck up moisture and then are no good. Arctec 223 is an excellent rod, use any where 7018 is used and does not suck up moisture which is what makes it so popular with the guys who use it.
I think your the 2nd guy that mentioned the Artec 223 rod in place of the E7018 rod, I took a quick look back then and it seemed to be a rod only found in Canada, I can be mistaken, I'm going to email one of the four main offices to see if its distributed in the USA. If there is such a problem with the E7018 rod sucking up moisture, I wonder why its not packaged with them chemical packets that remove moisture, like you find in certain vitamin bottles. I would think it should be sold in a special container? so I'll get one of them storage containers I see at Harbor Freight that have the rubber seal.
A few thoughts. Most of them appear to have been covered but maybe an idea to summarize. 1. If there is a master battery switch fitted (not all machines have them), turn it off. Disconnect the negative cable from the battery. Disconnect and isolate the negative cable from its terminal on the rear of the alternator. 2. Hook the ground cable of the welding machine up to the piece you are welding. 3. If there are any machine wiring harnesses close by, protect them from possible weld spatter. 4. Don't use machine electrical harness grounding lugs as a ground connection point for your welder ground cable. There is literally loads of information out there about welding on buckets, so you have no need to go reinventing the wheel all over again. Try posting a few photos of the cracks and I'll trawl through what I have and see if I can find some specific repair procedures applicable to your crack locations. So, and I enjoy doing this ............ :witpic
I can not use it here at work because we are a CWB shop (Canadian Welding Bureau) and 223 is not a certified rod. I was tol dthat what makes it not soak up water is nasty stuff in the flux coating (something like arsenic). Asked the sales rep about this and he said it was not certified because they sell enough of it and feel that the cost of getting a rod certified was not worth it (which I do not believe). So we can not use it but loggers and contractors can use it and it was very popular in maintenance department of sawmills, pulp mills and mines. So if it is not available in the US I would lean towards the flux containing nasty stuff. Cheers L D
You got it my friend, I'll make an effort tomorrow to take pictures with my cell phone and hope they come out clear showing what I need to weld. It's a Wain-Roy quick release bucket, its a great bucket to pop on and off in seconds by your self.
Don't you just love listening to a salesman fill you full of trash talk most likely with out even knowing it because they are most likely just repeating what the rep of the company said that promotes their equipment on the phone. If the rod has an arsenic type poison in it then of course its not going to be certified in my opinion. thats admitting the rod is especially dangerous. For the most part I haven't read up on arc welding in many years so I have no idea what I'm breathing in now with the E6018 I'm practicing with. I figure I'll set up a fan to move the air around, as long as I can't smell it come into the helmet I'm okay with that.
Personally never heard of this Artec 223 rod, I will enquire next time at the LWS. As far as poison in the coating is concerned I think all welding rods have small amounts of nasty things that get nastier in the heat of an arc so not breathing the fumes is mandatory. Dessicant packs will keep the rods dry until opening but that is not the problem. The low hydrogen (7018) rods are shipped in hermetically sealed packaging and will keep dry indefinitely in any reasonable storage above water. The moisture gets picked up once the package is opened and once this takes place they need to be placed in a rod storage oven. Once they pick up moisture dessicant packs or even the average rod storage oven will not dry the rods. You can dry them in an electric self cleaning kitchen oven if you follow manf. directions. You should take out of the rod oven no more rods than can be used in an hour or two at most. For critical welds I have portable ovens to take to the job and take rods out a couple at a time. Plastic rod storage containers and dessicant is not approved for any code quality welding that I know of. The only acceptable storage I know of is a proper rod oven. I have a large storage oven and two portable rod ovens, bought them all used at decent prices. Inquired about buying one long ago and after finding out how expensive a new one was then I was on the build it myself track until I acquired the manf. ones (Gullco) over a period of a few years.
i tend to buy 7018 in smaller packages it comes out a little more expensive that way but i don't weld for a living and i don't have a butt ton of rod going to waste either
Good to know norite…., I see now welding professionals and even people who prefer to do their own welding on their heavyweight equipment need to be 100% on top of their welding skills. Like you mentioned monster76..., What I'll do is to buy my E7018 rods when I'm prepped and ready to weld the bucket.
To keep welding electrodes (esp. low hydrogen ones) dry after opening the packet all you need to do is build a small sealed cupboard with a 60W lamp constantly burning in it.
A friend of mine did that same thing with an old refrigerator. We had several different kinds of rods in it including low hydrogen and they seemed to be just fine after long term storage in it.
I've also seen it done with an old fridge as well. The bad thing about a fridge is they seal really well so you have to poke a 1/4" or 1/2" hole in the top somewhere in order to let the humidity out.
I have two smaller tote sized rod ovens, they are not strong enough to cook the moisture out of the rods so I use an old baking oven, set to 400 degrees until the flux sheath turns a richer gray color, then they go to the totes in small quantities. I will generally buy up to 25# at a time if I know I have a bigger job coming up. I usually buy 5# canisters and don't open the tins(I buy from a welding supply company and not discount stores) until I am ready to cook them up. Once cooked they will stay dry in a old fridge with a single 100W light bulb set in the bottom. Another old welder trick on suspect rods, stick the rod to the plate and let it start to draw full amps with no arc, knock it loose and then start to weld. On such jobs as here, I will take a torch and heat the local area I will weld for a while on the repeat the process as I move around or await a really warm summer day to sweat out the job.
When welding with low-hydrogen electrodes it's always a good practice before starting to weld to pre-heat the workpiece to maybe 50 DegC (125 DegF) for maybe a 12" circle around the area you're planning on welding to drive out any moisture that may be there. A lot of people would be amazed at what comes out of steel even if you just wave an oxy-acetylene torch near it, sunny day or not.
With the talk about custom built heat boxes for the 7018 rod storage I was thinking, the rod manufacturer must have information about this on their web site, and on the paper that comes with the rods. I'm curious what their suggested recommendations are for storage once the package is opened. I'll take a look and even email them to see what they say.
Most of rod control information comes as training from the welding schools and the information supplied from the rod manufacturers. Should be some information they should be able to supply you. Our nuclear rated and certified 7018 welding rods come into the plant in 25# tins, sealed from the factory, it is common knowledge they must be 'kilned' for at least 24 hours at 500 degrees F before they can be used in plant, rod issues sent out in heated totes have to be plugged in prior to use for 1/2 hour and if left unattended/unplugged for greater than 8 hours the rods are scrapped.
What is it that you see on the steel when you said waiving a torch near it before welding it to remove the moisture? like steam? or a color change like pimples? I'm curious?
We need to keep our unopened boxes of 7018 in a warm rod room, once opened,use some, the rest straight into the rod oven and heated to something like 400 deg F. Rods can only be reheated once and must be discarded there after. All this is required for welding items for our clients, it is a little over kill for a guy wanting to weld his own bucket. Even the do it yourselfers need to keep 7018(or any low hydrogen rods) warm. They will weld better and give you a better finished weld , some would say stronger weld then that obtained with wet rods. When you preheat if you look closely you will see a line moving away from flame. This is moisture that is in the steel due to steel being porous. Moisture in steel and rods will lead to "Hydrogen induced cold cracking". During the weld process any hydrogen will turn into atomic hydrogen. When the weld cools, the atomic hydrogen returns to hydrogen which requires something like 400 times the area(or volume) then atomic Hydrogen particles so pressure builds up and "BANG" something has to give which is usually the weld or area right beside the weld and a crack develops. Go into a shop an hour or two after quitting time that is not preheating or keeping rods dry and you will hear welds letting go.
I hate to disagree with you Nige, I always read your posts and learn so much from them but go to Lincoln's website or any man'f of 7018 rod and see their storage requirements once a package of rods is open. I started out with an old fridge with a light bulb years ago and while probably better than leaving them out unprotected from the humidity, you are just exposing them to less than the ambient humidity, not eliminating it. In Canada CWB (similar to AWS) certification can be lost by a welding shop if they are found by an inspector, not keeping opened rods in an oven before and during use.
I agree with you regarding the electrode manufacturer's recommendations, however there are times when following them slavishly is not necessarily the way to go. We're not doing coded welding, only welding scabby lumps of mining machinery, so those rules don't apply either. TBH the one thing I insist on is preheating all steel that is going to be welded simply to drive out the moisture. Let's not over-think this. It started as a discussion about how to help a guy repair a backhoe bucket. All of a sudden we're building a nuclear power plant........
Besides heating the steel (you can actually see the steel clear away as the moisture leaves, at first will be a ring where hit it with torch) you need to grinder or flap disc remove any mill finish or remnant skin of corrosion. Black oxide 'rust' is as hard or harder to weld through than brown rust, will even make slag more difficult to deal with. You need a shiny region of fresh cleaned steel to get a good finish weld. I too am a rough duty welder Nige, not so much to code but closer than just scabbing things together as so many do. I don't like to redo my redo's if I don't have to so a better weld with a better rod gives me more field time than down time. My old Allis has a lot of previous owner scabs I clear away as I can and as they fail, amazing how many try to use flux core wire welders on heavy machinery.
How about we make this more complicated lol…. I just received the delivery of the E7018 Welding Rods, printed on the side of the box the rods are packaged in are the notations about the rod, then I read about half way down the paragraph where it says, "This electrode is recommended for welding hardened steels where "no" preheat is used". Oh Geeeze! what now lol...? The brand name of this E-7018 I got is called Firepower by Victor Technologies International, inc. Looks like they distribute world wide. So should I guess there are other versions of the 7018..? I was assuming each rod marked with a number was a standardized rod, so if you ran out and bought another brand while on the road it was going to be the same results. I don't mean to sound like I'm building a nuclear submarine with the questions sometimes going off on being too technical... like Nige said, "I'm just someone fixing a hoe bucket" who now has been armed with some good knowledge that I appreciate having learned from everyone. I'm also a hack welder, so I appreciate hearing from everybody. The 7018 rods were delivered yesterday, they are packaged in a thin cardboard wrapped with plastic, when I opened the box they were delivered in the cardboard box the rods were packaged in were all destroyed, so obviously the rods have been exposed to moisture having been smashed open…., at this point I'm not going to worry about this and just use them, like it was mentioned I'm not building a submarine, as long as it holds…. maybe pictured today of the cracked bucket... I don't know how often this happens to anybody else, no matter which delivery company delivers a package to my house that has something heavy inside like the 5 lb box of welding rods, every single time without fail I can expect it to be delivered to my home all smashed up as if the packaged was kicked down the road all the way to my house rather than driven in a motor vehicle. even with my ammo too…. I'm going to start a photo album of each box.
Joe, we need to differentiate between "preheat" which usually means heating the steel to be welded to something like 300-400 DegF before starting to weld (usually used when welding more "exotic" steels) and "warming sufficient to drive out the moisture from cold steel". You're warming, not pre-heating - so you're good to go. E7018 is a standard, any electrode manufactured to that standard is going to be pretty much the same. As you've probably gathered from what's been posted so far low hydrogen electrodes don't like moisture, so drive it out of the steel before you start. Good point from DMiller about getting rid of all the black crap as opposed to just the red/brown rust which is also a good practice. Still waiting for your photos .......
Okay Nige, I see what you mean. I can't wait to start the job now that I have learned how to do this the right way, I just need to practice now. The rods are very unusual looking, having a smooth glossy finish, seems like a ceramic finish. It's an over cast wet day here today, so not sure how good of a picture day it will be, but I'll try anyway and post what I take.
Post your photos and give me a chance to see if I can find some documentation giving detailed "how to do it" procedure before you start burning rods on your cracks.
Here are the pictures of the Hoe bucket. Of course this is damage from pushing rocks using the edge.
Loader Pictures… John Deere 310C The pictures where the arms that connect to the loader bucket seems like its not a crack as much as where the edge of the two bars of steel were joined together with out welding, but it looks like a crack, 3 pictures down, not sure what to make of this.
More Loader bucket...
Mega - now the dog can see the rabbit. Give me a day or so to see what I can dig up. Meantime send me a PM with your e-mail address so that I can send you whatever I find. I can't send attachments via the HEF site e-mail.
Yair . . . There always seems to be a lot of discussion about rods which leaves me a bit bemused. I built my first bull bar for a Landrover when I was thirteen and here, nearly sixty years later, after thousands of repairs, building dozens of trailers, a twenty meter steel trawler, several smaller boats, various sheds and Lord alone knows what else I have only ever used three rods, a basic GP 6012/6013, a low hydrogen, (usually preheated on the manifold of the Perkins) and lots of Iron Powder . . . and Oh yeah make that four, a bit of stainless when required. All the fancy stuff, cast and what-all I did with TIG. On straight forward repairs like on a backhoe bucket why would you stuff around with low hydrogen. Grind it out and, on the flat, flow some hot iron powder in there and put it back to work. If you are a part time welder a good GP with a bit of preheat and high amps will hold better on stuff like cutting edge than gorilla snot low hydrogen. Them's my thoughts anyway, others will disagree. Cheers.
Final pics of the loader, no more picture unless you like to ask for more. This is the loader showing the crack on the outside and inside the loader bucket.
As always our Colonial friend makes a valid point .............. Joe, PM me your e-mail address. I've found a load of bedtime reading for you ...............
Hi Scrub Puller….. Keep it coming my friend, there is nothing I love better than good old hands on of years and years of experience from someone such as your self…, thanks for looking in But you know Scrub…, what I believe in today to a certain extent is having all them dozens of welding rods to choose from have to do with how many ways you can sell snake oil in another label lol…. but then I do have to admit in the years gone by steel technology has become quite a bit advanced, making so many different levels and different types of steel. Like the high strength steel being introduced into the making of automobiles not all that long ago.
Take your time on all of them, find the ends of each crack and drill a hole, prep by 'V' grinding, any sheet steel that seems to be disrupted or hard flexed and bowed you may want to cut loose by torch or grinder and clamp then weld back into position. Those abrasion plates areas should be thoroughly dressed of any folded and displaced metal or the entire patch cut away with a replacement set in. At the far ends of the front bucket bottom there are erosion plates/guides for the corners, would do a world of good to add a few 4"or 6" abrasion straps from cutting edge to rear of front bucket at pin bolsters. Add abrasion straps along the sides of the hoe bucket along the side/bottom seam, will protect the weld seam from future erosion failure wear.
The "bedtime reading" e-mails went off to Joe a few minutes ago.
Yair . . . joeeye59 . Fair enough with your post #61 comments. (he grins) I know I am not up with the times but all around me I see folks stuffing round doing stuff with the latest this and that and I just plod along doing as I have always done and it seems to mostly work. I have never used a MIG (apart from on ally) and it really gets up my nose to see repair work being done outdoors with wire feed and gas. General field maintenance I believe is best done with stick. For repairing parts of unknown steel composition I believe nothing can come close to the TIG with 316 wire. Thirty five years ago I used to have nice little earner going repairing marine exhaust bellows by sealing off a section of the convolutes with a strip of rolled sixteen gauge sheet. The actual bellows material is pretty thin, I think around thirty thou but, with young eyes and a steady hand and using the thicker sixteen gauge for a heat sink it was possible to get a very professional finish and they ended up looking just like the manufactured article at a premium rate to me but a fraction of the cost of a new one. These days with the improvements in welding technology I thought such repairs would be simple and common place. Not so it seems. I took one off a mates boat into a local fab shop for repair a while ago and they laughed and told me it couldn't be done and he needed to shell out for a new one. My eyes and hands weren't good enough to show them but I explained how to do it and, to his credit the boss bloke had a crack at it and when he succeeded he shook my hand and said well, "I'll be fu**ed" Cheers.
I didn't mean to imply you need a rod oven to weld your bucket with 7018. I was trying to point out that improvised storage methods of OPENED packages of 7018 will not maintain the low hydrogen properties. I welded for more than a few years before I had my own rod ovens. When I was welding something that needed the best welds possible, a bucket is a good example because of the pounding, banging, low temperatures (winter), bending stress and torsion they are subjected to, I would open a small package at a time of new man'f sealed rods and do my welding asap, no breaks until the small package was used up. After the job was finished I would keep the remainder of the opened container of rods in a dry place and use those rods for non critical or temporary welds. As I said previously when I learned the benefits of storing LH rods in an oven, (Lincoln Procedure Handbook of Arc Welding, one of the best welding texts out there, you all should have a copy on the shelf in your reading room) I went down to the local LWS intending to buy one. I figured a tin box with a door, a strip heater, potentiometer and a thermostat couldn't cost that much. Wrong!, the ones we had at work cost over a thousand dollars, no wonder no ordinary guy buys one. You could buy a nice welder for that kind of cash back then. So I decided I would build my own and went about acquiring strip heaters, bulb thermostats, potentiometers etc. salvaged from other equipment here and there. Biggest problem was building a box within another box so insulation could be packed in between. Figured I needed a metal brake so it wouldn't be too heavy as it would be if I just welded it up out of plate steel. Anyway have yet to score the used metal brake I want, haven't really got room for one anyway, so the rod oven project sat idle for a few years. Then I found my first (large) oven in the local classifieds for $150 so I jumped on it. Since then I have seen two portable rod ovens come up for sale again in the local classifieds for $75 each so I jumped on them. Got all the rod ovens I expect to ever need now, oddly talking to the sellers afterward, they said nobody showed much interest in the rod ovens which I thought was odd because I had saved myself at least $1500 - $2000 over buying new ones. As I said before I guess most guys don't know or don't care about storing or using LH rod. If someone has good plans for a nice rod oven, I am sure others would be interested.
That sounds good DMiller, I didn't think about drilling holes at either end of the cracks. I'm going to look for the erosion plates you mentioned that were made for this to fix the crack on the bottom of the front bucket. Because at first I had an idea how to fix the front bucket bottom was to hammer the crack back closed and weld, which is what I'm going to do either way, then section in by welding something like a 3 by 3 inch of angle iron over the bottom bucket corner. I just need to make sure I buy the strong steel, I don't want to come across angle iron from a bed frame because I don't think thats strong carbon steel.
Now you make me want to sit down with an Electrician friend of mine and work with him to design the electrical side of making a very nice oven box, and I'll bend up some sheet metal to make a very affordable oven to sell to friends. something very light weight and primitive that works great.
Thank you dearly Scrubs for sharing the stories with me, I wish I had a friend like you who came around once in a while… When will everybody realize you can do anything with knowledge
Just for general interest, bed frame angle is actually much harder than mild steel. Most of them are made of T2 steel. It makes sense if you think about a couple of 250 lbs plus people getting athletic on that bed. (Myself, I do NOT want to think about that!)
Oh Geeeze! then some bed frames must have titanium in them, I didn't even think about the adults blowing off steam by jumping up and down on the bed before going to sleep
:falldownlaugh
Well, I guess it's time to bring this thread back from the abyss! I know very little about welding. I have a small 120v mig welder that I assume is insufficient for the job at hand but it sounds like there is an affordable 120v/220v stick welder at HF that may do the trick? While I'd prefer to not have to weld this a thousand times I don't know that I'm smart enough to keep up with all the 7018 talk from above, so ideally I'd like to keep it as simple as possible. I don't mind it if it's as simple as clean up the areas to be welded, heat them a bit, open the 7018 and use it but it sounds like it's wise to practice with the 7018 a bit and I've never stick welded anything. What do you guys think? Can an amateur do this or should I just find a new bucket? Is there a point where the bucket is too far gone? I didn't notice these cracks until yesterday when I just happened to be standing at eye level to the bucket, so I have no idea how long they've been there.
Not really a job for an amateur. It will require a lot of grinding to prepare those cracks to welded properly. There is a huge amount of stress on there when it is under a load. I would suggest taking it off the machine and have a welding shop repair it. IMHO.
Have you been running into trees? Those are some serious cracks and as Tinkerer pointed out, will require some skill to properly repair. A lot of pre welding work would be required too. There are some great teaching videos on Youtube covering this but that would require a lot of time and a lot of tools including a much more powerful welder. You would have to develop a skill level competent to what's required.
Thanks guys, I was afraid of that. I have no idea of what has caused the cracks. I've certainly used that machine without even thinking that it was possible to crack the bucket, so digging stumps, rocks, or whatever. I guess now I have to learn how to remove a hoe bucket! It seems like it may be worth while just getting a brand new bucket, huh? A couple hundred to repair this one vs. a bit more for one brand new? I haven't really gone and priced stuff though.
That's not difficult welding but if you're new to stick welding that's not a good place to learn. Taking the bucket off and getting it to a shop sounds like a pain in the ass. Can't you find someone with a stick welder to come visit you? Either a friend or find some jackass on Craigslist? I'd grind it deep, fill it with weld, grind that smooth and depending on the situation id cover it with some 1/4 plate iron patches or angle iron or whatever. 7018 is better but 6013 is just soooo easy to use and it'll hold for a long time on that metal. 7018 is really important on hard metal like cutting edges, I've found, and for hard facing. But just for cracks in buckets I squirt 1/8 6013 all over it and go to the next job.
With the problem at hand the big concern is PREP Correct cutting into the welded area to a V to adequately fuse those materials and CLEAN enough to accept said welds Preheating to push out entrained moisture and not end up with mass inclusions in the welds 7018 is NOT for faint hearted or novice welders
That's some good advice right there. I have put structural shapes in the bright sun to help drive off moisture. Getting it all real clean is critical regardless of the welding rod used. Done properly, a 60 series rod would be fine.
I found a couple cracks in my hoe's boom. I am not equipped with a large enough welder nor are my skills good enough to tackle this. I Googled searched for a mobile welder and I found one with a Facebook page that was loaded with pictures of him welding heavy equipment. I reached out and he came out and repaired the cracks for me. He also repairs and rebuilds buckets. Many pictures of him doing that on his page. I am sure you can hunt someone down in your area that will come and square you away. I am not a Social media guy but I do have a Facebook account solely for this type of purpose. I have a fake profile picture, all my personal data is incorrect. Turns out my welder uses a flip phone and does not do Facebook, his wife does it.
aighead, The bucket is not hard to remove and install. It is just 2 pins. I have done mine multiple times because I have 2 different size buckets...1 for digging, and a small one for removing stumps. Anyhow, if it is like mine it has a retainer on each pin that keeps a pin locked in place. Once the retainer is off, you can push the pin out and the collar then slides off. First, set the bucket till it is just resting on the ground. To remove the outer locking ring, I used a pair of 9" Right Angle 90 Degree Lock Ring Pliers. I purchased these from EBay for $20, and they are made in the USA. To drive out the pins, I use round stock. You can buy cutoffs on EBay, cheap. Make sure it is a softer grade of steel. To reinstall, open the window, and idle the machine so I can adjust till the pin slides right in. Note: while I have the pins out, I wire wheel them and clean, then use lube on them and the bushings prior to install. Then once it is all together, I lube with the grease gun. Pliers The parts breakdown of the lock and pin...they are both the same style. A good pic of the locking mechanism. I put the long side of the Lock Ring Pliers in the angled cut you see on the outer locking ring and it comes right out. Installed on my machine. Obviously that is before I cleaned it
This is the drift I like to use...I think it is 1" steel. I like it because I can put the vice-grips on it to hold it. I do have larger drifts that I use...up to 2", depending the pin size. Again, these are just cutoffs. An example of an EBay cutoff: https://www.ebay.com/itm/283469777860?hash=item42001d8bc4:g:PT0AAOSwnLFdQ0jm
Thanks for the tips guys. I'm intrigued by stick welding and will undoubtedly get into it at some point but knowing my habits I'll never get good at it. I'll definitely look around for a mobile welder. My neighbor welds and claims he's pretty good at it but I probably won't bother him with it. I found a brand new bucket for a reasonable price but don't know if it'll really fit and it sounds like a miserable process to remove and replace one. (I started writing this before @Swetz so graciously told me otherwise!) You guys all rock! God bless HEF!
Hey aighead...... your talking about your loader bucket aren't you?? Your pics are of that?? I think Swetz was talking 'bout his hoe bucket.....???
T-town...I hope it is the rear bucket...surly this cannot be the front loader.
@T-town it is the backhoe bucket, pretty much cracked all the way around the joint that connects to the pins and dipper. I did realize after posting the pictures that I didn't give much context of where the issues really are.
Aighead, how long have you owned this backhoe and how many hours have you put on it? I'd bet those cracks were there when you bought the backhoe, they might have even swapped a bad bucket onto the backhoe and kept the good one when it was sold. I think I see a weld repair that covered the original crack, if you do a little better than that you could get a lifetime of your use out of the bucket. If you're not running your business around this hoe, then I'd let the neighbor have a shot at it with whatever he's comfortable with, and let us know how it holds up. The cracks should be ground out before welding, but if you weld right over it with enough amps you'll get decent penetration, and the worst that will happen is it cracks again and you have a little more weld to grind off.
It's true, just have your neighbor weld it up a little and keep working. These aren't the kind of things that demand a lot of attention or stop you from working. Buy a stick welder and start playing with it. It's an important skill to have if you play with old machines. They aren't even that expensive anymore. Have your neighbor show you how to use it. It takes a half hour to learn how to weld thick metal on a flat workbench. Eventually you get up to doing it on thin metal upside down and backwards with your eyes closed while hanging off a safety harness.
...LOL
Sorry guys...... Some of that 'bracing' in the pics looked a lot like what's on my loader bucket brackets.... Don't have any of that on my older JD hoe bucket......which by the way I have 'ripped' open at the seams a couple of times now fighting with buried boulders..... talk about a hack welding job.... but its holding for now. But I am going to look at a used bucket this weekend...
@Delmer I got it in April of 2019, so it just had it's 3rd birthday in my possession. I've probably put less than a thousand hours on it, maybe significantly less, I haven't paid attention to the hour meter lately. I was trying to get a good look at some of the pictures I took when it was brand new to me and there do seem to be a few signs that it was a repair job, but I can't tell for sure. I don't believe that the bucket was changed between purchase and delivery, but could be wrong there. I also think you guys are right, in that I should try a reweld rather than a new bucket. My neighbor wasn't talking to me for several months but I've hopefully solved that this past weekend, when I went over to mend fences. Maybe I can talk him into helping. Thanks, as always, fellas!
I use my backhoe as a welding booth. Might have something in the loader bucket, or on forks on a table. In some cases I chain a heavy object to the hoe bucket to turn it for easier position. The work lead is always clamped to the workpiece. I've never had an issue. With stick welding; I can't say what the steel is. I'm sure it is high carbon, likely alloyed. Cutting edge has several alloys including manganese. Torch cut, grind, plasma, or gouge to expose for full penetration weld. Grind clean! Preheat is important. It drives away hydrogen, slows the cooling to form more favorable crystalline structure. Most important; it expands the bucket so when the weld shrinks as it cools it doesn't have to stretch as much. 7018 I believe is your best filler. It is quite ductile. As it shrinks, it stretches rather than break. There are higher tensile versions of 7018 (11018) but it lacks ductility. When it shrinks, it tends to break fusion with the workpiece.
Here are a few pics of the "patches" we put on my old hoe bucket.... ripped her open at the 'seam'.. I was fighting a rock.... and the bucket lost. But.... I now have a couple spares..!!