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Welding Practice

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Mike Armstrong

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 17, 2006
Messages
206
Location
near San Diego
My goal is to build a tube and fabric aeroplane, ala the Spacewalker II. However, in order to do so I want to learn to weld 4130 proficiantly. I've thought about buying one of those 'grab bag' boxes of discarded tubing or buying legnths of the actual size tubing I'm going to use and just start welding piles of clusters till my dumpster is full but besides 'just' learning to weld I thought it would be very useful if during that long process I was actually constructing something directly related to my eventual project. I certainly dont want to build any part of my actual airplane this early on in the learning curve but instead build something I can practice on and visually learn from when it's done.

I'm thinking of honing my welding skills on a 1/2 scale replica of my projects fuselage. In doing so I can learn to build the same jigs, cut, fit and weld the same clusters and visually/mentally go thru the same steps needed to build the actual airframe. Any modifications such as fuselage formers can be mocked up and later enlarged to fit the 'real' fuselage which, when it comes time to build, I will have already constructed (at least) once hopefully learning from my mistakes the first time and now bringing my newly honed skills into play for the real thing.

Does this sound like a good idea or am I being too cautious and just delaying my project for months longer than I need to? Should I just take a SportAir welding workshop and start building!? Will building to 1/2 scale using smaller diameter 4130 of the same thickness (.035) replicate closely what building the actual size project will be like? Being new to homebuilding has anyone else here used this approach? Thanks


Mike
 
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