My good friend Andrew Cardin came for a visit and we filmed a few videos.

This is one of them.

We set out to weld a simple outside corner joint on some 1/8" thick pieces of 5052  aluminum and while the welds looked ok, something was just not quite right.

So we stopped and did a quick down and dirty test on argon flow rates to see if we noticed a difference in cleaning action path.

The results were eye opening for me.  

A day later, Another friend came to visit and he brought his argon flow rate tester.

We learned the flowmeter was off quite a bit.

So while 20cfh of argon flow usually provides good results with a #7 gas lens cup, increasing to 30cfh made a huge difference in the puddle.

A test piece was used to determine the spot size of the cleaning action at different flow rates using a clear #7 furick cup.

 Once we set the argon flow rate to the optimum spot size for cleaning action, 

The bead flowed better and came out much shinier. 

Stay tuned for a future video on tuning argon flow rates.

PS. the clear cup I used in this video is the new Furick #7 and I have put together a nice Lucky #7 combo kit that includes one clear cup and one ceramic along with all mounting hardware like collet, gas lens, insulator, and o rings.