Magna maintenance welding

Magna 770 –

High-Strength Non-Cracking Machinable Electrode for Cast Iron.  Excellent for practically ALL
types of cast iron.  Requires absolutely no pre-heating in most cases.  Further links to cast iron
welding procedures are available by clicking on the Magna 770 link above.  Tensile strength up
to 58,500 p.s.i. (41.0 Kg/mm2).

A Great Metallurgical Breakthrough!  For the First Time, You Can Now Weld Cast Iron
Positively Crack-Free!

Without dismantling... totally without preheat... even on oil-saturated, dirty cast iron... this
cuts your machinery downtime and enables you to save motor blocks, gears, housings and
machinery parts you' ve always had to scrap before.

Magna 770 has all these advantages:

 Machinable through and through without hard spots

 All position welding characteristics
 Highest elongation ever built into a cast iron electrode positively prevents cracking
 Gives perfect welds on all kinds of cast iron including malleable iron, grey iron,
ductile iron, meehanite, and steel to cast iron
 Highest tensile strength ever achieved
 Low viscosity slag enables you to weld pass-on-pass without removing slag
between passes
 Non-cracking feature enables continuous welding without stopping between passes

Tensile Strength Electrode Sizes

Typical Hardness
up to p.s.i. Current
Brinell
(kg/mm2)

4.8mm-3/16"
4.0mm-5/32"
58,500 (41) 160 AC-DC RP
3.2mm-1/8"
2.4mm-3/32"
 Magna maintenance welding

How to weld cast iron MAGNA 770

 
Cast iron is a most common metal in industry because of its simplicity of manufacture. It
can be cast with only a gas furnace whereas steel, having a higher melting point, requires
an electric furnace for casting. Cast iron can be machined easier and at higher speeds
than steel. This metal alloy is readily and economically manufactured into useful machinery
because of its low melting point, fluidity, and simplicity of melting.

Cast iron is manufactured from an endless number of formulae. A great deal of scrap iron
of unknown analysis is used in manufacturing cast iron. Most cast iron contains in addition
to iron and carbon, silicon, manganese, sulphur, and phosphorous.

The main difference between steel and cast iron is its carbon content. Mild steel contains
less than 0.30% carbon, and most high carbon steel contain less than 1.0% carbon. The
maximum carbon that can be put into steel is 1.7% as this is the maximum carbon that can
be absorbed in solution with iron. When larger amounts of carbon are combined with iron,
the carbon not absorbed by the iron is present in the form of small flakes of graphite. Grey
iron contains up to 4.5% carbon, usually between 3.0% and 4.0%.

When cast iron is heated, at a temperature near its melting point, practically all of the
carbon goes into solution with the iron in a combined form of iron carbide. If the cast iron is
allowed to cool very slowly nearly all of the carbon will pass out of the combined state and
segregate as free flakes of graphite. If the iron is cooled rapidly a large portion of the
carbon will remain combined with the iron as iron carbide.

It is this high carbon content that makes cast iron so different from steel. If we could
remove the graphite flakes from cast iron and squeeze what is left together, we would have
steel.

The factor of the two forms in which the carbon can exist in cast iron requires major
attention in welding. If the cast iron (or parts of it) is melted and then cools slowly, the weld
and the base metal will be soft and machinable. If cast iron is melted during welding and
cooled rapidly, the cast iron, or at least areas of it, will be hard and difficult if not impossible
to machine. This is what causes the condition of "hard-spots" in cast iron welds.

Because cast iron has the flake-graphite structure which prevents it from bending and
causes it to have no elongation, it breaks readily. It is a common event in factories,
construction companies, farms, and all other industries for cast iron machinery to fracture.
Often a costly casting breaks simply from vibration. Costly downtime from mishap with cast
iron machinery is common in industry. Also, because cast iron is soft, it often wears. For
example in threaded holes, the threads wear or strip easily. No one can estimate the loss
to industry by breakage of automobile and truck motor blocks, exhaust manifolds,
transmission housings, and in factories of such indispensable machines such as pump
housings, punch presses, electric motor housings and the myriad of other cast iron
machinery components.
 Magna maintenance welding

When a cast iron part breaks, the cost is enormous to almost any industry. It is impossible
for an industry to carry spare castings in their store room. Often the machinery is old and
obsolete and the manufacturer cannot provide a spare. To make a new casting usually
involves making a pattern first. This can take up to four weeks just to make a pattern and
often the pattern can cost thousands of dollars.

It is for these reasons that industry must be well prepared with Magna Maintenance
Welding Electrodes and Alloys, to enable quick restoration of the broken machinery to
useful service. Many engineers who have encountered repeated failures in attempts to
repair cast iron with ordinary cast iron production welding rods.

Some engineers state that they have been able to weld cast iron, in some cases using
brazing rods or gas welding rods, which require a long complicated procedure. Usually
brazing or gas welding cast iron involves: Dismantling; building a fireplace around the
casting; preheating, often for as much as 24 hours; gas welding; burying the casting in lime
or other insulating material; and slow cooling for up to one week.

The answer to successful welding of cast iron is the development of Magna 770 which has
brought industry a practical solution.

Maintenance-designed cast iron electrode

There are a number of companies that market production welding cast iron electrodes.
They usually offer from 3 to 7 different cast iron electrodes, since they readily admit that
each electrode has only a limited range of applications on which it can be used on.

Obviously welding electrode manufacturers that offer several different electrodes for cast
iron are not capable of serving the needs of maintenance. Such a variety of cast iron
electrodes, each with a limited scope of usage, is generally all right for production welding
where only a limited number of applications exist. A production factory manufacturing, for
example, pumps and has only one analysis and one thickness of cast iron to weld under
perhaps only one condition, can select one of these production cast iron electrodes for the
one application.

In maintenance the conditions are completely different. In maintenance they never

know what type of cast iron will break, what thickness it will be or whether or not the
weld will have to be machined or not. Generally they do not know what the analysis
of the casting that may break will be.

MAGNA has solved this old industrial problem of cast iron failures with Magna 770, which
welds all types of cast iron, thick or thin, including grey, malleable, meehanite and
nodular iron. It welds in all positions, including overhead or vertical. It makes
porosity-free welds without undercut. The welds are fully machinable and crack-free.
Magna 770 even welds cast iron to steel.

Magna 770 is the one practical solution that can help you prevent costly downtime and
loss of profit due to cast iron failure.
 Magna maintenance welding
 

Magna maintenance welding techniques

 
Maintenance welding requires a combination of skill, ingenuity, confidence, imagination and
determination, all intermingled with scientific principles. Welding, of course, involves the
four sciences of chemistry, metallurgy, physics and engineering. One without the others will
fail. However, proper proportions of all will result in greater savings through maintenance
welding.

(1) One of the great difficulties in maintenance welding is the fact that the know-how steps
often have to be carried out by the welder himself. In a production plant, metallurgists and
engineers generally supply the informational know-how, while the welder or operator only
provides the manipulative skill. This is not the case in maintenance welding.

(2) The maintenance welder must have a great many more talents than a production
welder. First of all, in production welding it is usually the case that the base metals being
worked on are clean, new metals. This is not so in maintenance. Often the maintenance
welder is faced with salvaging equipment which may be many, many years old, having had
service in corrosive conditions, may be oily or greasy and so dirty and contaminated that
everything in the text book goes wrong when the welder attempts to weld repair it.

(3) In production welding, it is usually possible to position the work so that the welding can
be done in a convenient position, usually downhand. This is not so in maintenance welding
because as often as not the maintenance welder must repair objects and in awkward
positions which he can hardly see or reach, let alone weld.

(4) An additional difficulty in maintenance welding is the wide variety of work that must be
accomplished. Often in production welding, an operator will work on a limited number of
jobs constantly. In maintenance welding, the operator does not do one type of work
constantly; and as a result, he understandably cannot become proficient in every type of
work that he does, because certain types of breakdown occur so rarely.

It is extremely difficult for a mechanic to learn how to do all the myriad projects required in
maintenance welding efficiently. One of the most difficult problems in maintenance welding
is that the welder often does not know the analysis of the base metal.

(5) In spite of the fact that maintenance welding is more complex than production welding,
it is undoubtedly true that maintenance welding is far more profitable to a plant or industry
to do than production welding. Frequently, a maintenance welder does in one day, work
which may save his company hundreds, if not thousands of dollars. Such savings are not
possible with one man's time in one day in production welding.

(6) The first step in maintenance welding is to determine the base metal. Knowing
something about each metal will help identify metals. Spark tests, hardness tests, magnet
tests, chemical tests, weight tests and file tests are common methods of identifying base
metals. However, there are often cases where it is almost impossible to be certain enough
for safety by common shop methods of analysis. In those cases, it is imperative to use a
welding filler metal with the highest physical properties to make certain that the weld equals
or exceeds the base metal irrespective of what the base metal may be.

The second step in establishing a welding procedure is to calculate the effect of the heat to
be applied. All welding requires heat, and heat will cause a certain reaction to the base
metal.The heat generated in a weld is predictable from the formula OH=A2RTO (Heat
 Magna maintenance welding
equals amperage squared times resistance times welding time).

The undesirable effects of heat can be listed as excessive grain growth, hardening cracks,
porosity, thermal cracks, warpage, locked-up stresses, distortion, and hydrogen
contamination.

(7) The non-uniform localized heating and cooling during welding and the joining of the
heated base metal by means of the molten weld-filler metal creates a hindrance to both
expansion and contraction. The stresses arising through heating and cooling of the base
metal are called contraction or shrinkage stresses. The stress system left in the object
being joined after welding, due to thermal or shrinkage stress, is called the residual stress.

(8) A molten metal usually shrinks when it cools and solidifies. If all metals had a zero co-
efficient of expansion, most of the problems that occur in maintenance welding would be
non-existent. In a foundry, a molder¡¦s rule gives the expected contraction. In welding,
however, no such handy tool is available and the amount of stress can only be calculated
by the experience of the welder. In welding, the weld filler metal is applied in a liquidus and
is actually cast into a mold which is formed by the base metal.

(9) As in any metal casting into a mold, stress in the weld metal resulting from hindered
contraction is related in intensity to the dimensions of the weld. Therefore, the maximum
stress is in the direction of welding, longitudinally. The transverse stress is next intense and
the stress in the thickness direction is least because less hindrance to contraction occurs
here.

(10) Welds contract in all three directions - length, breadth and width - and the resulting
stress may be called multi-axial stresses. In maintenance, welders are constantly called
upon to solve welding problems where multi-axial stresses are a source of anxiety. The
thermal stress problem is accelerated when heat is applied locally and is dissipated into the
base metal mass. The harmful results of stress are both complex and of serious concern in
maintenance welding.

(11) The temperature gradient is the heat-affected zone; that is, the area starting from the
centre of the weld to the extremity to which the weld heat travels. Within this heat affected
zone most welding problems are created. Some sections of this heat affected zone may be
cooling while other parts are still being heated, which contributes to the thermal stress
problem. Unless there is an equal amount of residual compressive strength in the metal
system to balance the residual tensile strength, cracking will occur.

(12) The problem created by stress and distortion causes several difficulties. First, they
restrict normal ductility of the material. Second, they may cause localized stress corrosion
cracking that may fail under impact load. Stresses may exceed the yield strength of the
base metal and result in cracking. Additionally, a loss of dimensional stability occurs
through distortion.

The amount of stress and distortion which occurs in a part being welded depends upon a
number of variables such as thickness of plate, degree of restraint, speed of electrode
travel, movement of air, preheating, higher heat input and other factors. It is generally
assumed by most engineers, however, that a weld will contract approximately 3mm for
each 2.5cm of weld across section transversely. Longitudinally, a weld will, in general,
contract or shrink approximately 2-3mm for each 3m of weld length. The expansion and
 Magna maintenance welding
contraction rate of metal produces serious internal stresses and only requires a slight
excess strain to exceed the yield strength of the metal and produce weld failure.

(13) Another serious problem in maintenance welding is that of a martensitic zone adjacent
to a weld. When hardenable steel and cast iron are heated into their critical range and
allowed to cool faster than their critical cooling rate, a brittle martensitic zone tends to occur
next to the weld. This is due to the limited graphite rejection in the region adjacent to the
frontier zone between weld and base metal.

Other problems which occur in this region are carbide precipitation, grain growth, porosity
and hardening graphites. If a martensitic zone is allowed to occur.

(14) In addition to the problems already mentioned that occur in maintenance welding, an
added problem is that of stress raisers. Any factor which produces a localized area of high
stress is called a stress raiser.

Any engineer is aware that abrupt changes in section design, notches, grooves, screw
threads, surface irregularities and discontinuities such as cracks, holes and inclusions, are
considered stress raisers.

However, in maintenance welding, we are only concerned with those avoidable notches
which occur as a result of welding. These notches have very little effect on the tensile
strength of ductile materials but are of great importance in fatigue. The notch sensitivity
factor depends not only on the material but on the type of notch and level of stress. Those
notches which are avoidable are crater cracks, hard spots, undercuts and porosity.

(15) Take, for example, a typical butt weld. There are three starting points for fatigue
fracture. These are; internal defects an undercut at that point where the weld makes a
junction with the plat or base metal; and poor quality of weld at the root.

(16) The shape of the welding bead has a considerable influence on stress raisers,
especially on cast iron and the hardenable steels. For example, if a weld bead is applied to
a cold piece of base metal, at the beginning of the weld, the weld will appear to be convex
and lap over at the cold start. This makes perfect stress raiser and as such it will be highly
efficient in starting a crack.

Additionally, when the electrode is abruptly removed from a weldment, there will be a
crater at the end of the weld. A crater is often a source of cracks because a crater solidifies
from the outside towards the centre. Since the weld crater is a smaller mass than the
remainder of the welding bead, it will cool at a faster rate than the heavier section. These
conditions usually result in a starter crack and the creation of a severe stress raiser.

(17) Angular distortion is still another problem in maintenance welding. Angular distortion is
created when a contracting metal is shorter at the root of the weld than at the face of the
weld bead, such as in a single 'V' or 'J' root type joint.

Magna solutions:

These are the main problems of maintenance welding. There are without a doubt others,
but these are of utmost concern. Let¡¦s now review the solution to these problems.

When a martensitic zone, residual stress or distortion results after a weld has been made,
these conditions can be improved by stress relief or mechanical relief. However, the only
 Magna maintenance welding
practical solution is to anticipate these problems before the welding is accomplished and to
apply corrective measures to avoid their occurrence during welding.

Some of the techniques which we have employed to eliminate or minimize stress and
distortion follow. None of these techniques are empirical or can be used in every case, nor
are any of them absolutely foolproof. In may cases it will require more than one of these
corrective measures because in some instances, one alone will not be sufficient.

(1) An important technique we call the 'Buttering' technique. If you have a piece of metal
which has failed because of a fracture extending completely through the base metal, the
cracks very seldom occur at a convenient 90 degree angle. Sometimes a large piece will
fall out when the part is bevelled. The best system is to use a double 'V' or double 'U' joint,
but in many cases in maintenance welding this is not practical, since the weld must be
made entirely from one side due to the lack of accessibility.

(2) We have already mentioned that the amount of contraction is governed by the amount
of cross section of weld metal which exists. If faced with this problem, many inexperienced
welders might attempt to use a wide weave bead and fill up the large gap which is exposed
in such a joint.

However, a preferred solution is to 'butter' or pad the vacant spots and fill those in first,
leaving the root opening as small as possible before the root bead. The two sides should
also be coated and it is a good idea additionally, to allow the weld padding bead to overlap
the face of the plate for a small area. By using the buttering technique, we have greatly
reduced the amount of cross section of weld bead being applied at one time. We have now
substantially reduced the cross section of the area to be welded.

(3) The next step is to join the two sections together using substantial weld bead to prevent
a crack. By reducing the cross section of the weld area substantially, we have greatly
reduced the tendency for contraction and thus we will have less stress and less distortion.

(4) It was previously mentioned the problem of angular distortion which occurs from having
a shorter weld at the root than at the face of the weld. This can be eliminated by welding
from both sides. On heavy sections, as a matter of fact, it is important to use a double 'V' or
double 'U' and weld from both sides simultaneously if possible.

If only one welder is available, stagger the weld bead application from one side to the
other to make the tension balanced on both sides of the joint, thus eliminating angular
distortion. The buttering technique is especially advantageous when joining thick to thin
sections.

(5) Another solution which is often of indispensable help in welding heavy sections,
particularly of alloyed steel or cast iron, where a great deal of operational stress is
encountered, is what we call the 'anchoring' technique. This consists of cutting grooves
in the bevelled joint of the weldment. These grooves should be approximately 5mm deep
and should occur approximately 2.5cm apart.

These grooves are then filled in first of all with weld metal and then the exposed area of the
'V' is buttered or coated with weld bead before the joint is made. The grooves can be
achined or cut with a torch. A very good method of making the grooves is with Magna 100 -
a chamfering electrode which removes metal with incredible speed with the electric arc
without oxygen.
 Magna maintenance welding
(6) The anchoring technique, when working on dirty, oil saturated cast iron removes
contaminated metal and exposes the subsurface sound metal. Secondly, we are anchoring
the weld metal into the base metal in much the same way that a snow tread tire gives
better traction than a smooth tire when operating in the snow.

However, most important of all, we have broken up the continuity of a vulnerable

martensitic hardened zone adjacent to the weld. Thus, when stresses are applied, rather
than the weld failing adjacent to the weld, the continuity has been broken up so the strain
will not be focused at one vulnerable zone. Additionally, the grooves create a mechanical
bond and also result in more metal-to-metal contact for greater holding power.

(7) The anchoring technique is of immense value before applying hard facing alloys to
heavy equipment and is especially important when welding cast iron. We have seen jobs
accomplished successfully in this manner which were attempted time and time again with
failure with other methods.

(8) One if the most important ways to control stress and distortion is the practice of
peening, which consists of tapping the weld bead while still not with a rounded tool (such
as a ball-peen hammer). The reason for peening is that when a warm weld bead is peened
the weld metal is stretched and expanded. This stretching of the weld bead compensates,
at least to some extent, for the contraction which will occur upon cooling.

(9) There are several important things to know about peening. It is standard practice to
peen all but the first and last pass. If you are peening upon and air-hardening tool peened,
cracking may occur. Therefore, the first pass should not be peened. Subsequent passes
should all be peened up to the last pass, the cover pass. The reason these are not peened
is that a peened weld, and this is true even if it is mild steel, is a work-hardened weld bead,
and a work-hardened weld is an efficient crack starter.

(10) The internal passes will not be work-hardened because the subsequent weld beads
which are applied over them will anneal the work-hardened condition and does not cause
cracking.

(11) Incidentally, stress relieving after welding does not always relieve peening damage,
but subsequent welding does. Therefore, the rule in peening is to peen all but the first and
last passes. it is important to use moderate blows because repeated moderate blows are
much better for peening than a few heavy blows. It is imperative that the peening tool be
light in weight and blunt rather than sharp in design.

(13) One of the most universally used methods of controlling distortion and stresses is that
of preheating. Preheating before welding eliminates or lessens the danger of crack
formation, minimized hard zones adjacent to the welds, minimizes shrinkage stresses,
lessens distortion and enhances the diffusion of hydrogen from the steel. A rough but
realistic rule of thumb is that a 260 oC) preheat usually equals 800 oC of post heat (just as
an ounce of prevention is said to equal a pound of cure).

(14) Of course, the question in maintenance welding is: when is preheating necessary?
Many welders believe that it is never necessary to preheat on mild steel. This is a great
error because mild steel should always be preheated if the sections are over four inches
thick, as well as in other special cases.

The need for preheating is greatly increased if the piece being welded has - first, a large
mass; second, is at a low temperature, or is in an environment of lower temperature; third,
 Magna maintenance welding
if welded with small electrode diameters; fourth, is welded at high linear speed; fifth, has a
complicated shape and design; sixth, if the base metal has high carbon or high alloy
content; seventh, if it has an air-hardening capacity, or, finally, if it has a large variation in
size of adjacent parts. In these cases, preheating is all the more important.
 Magna maintenance welding

Maintenance welding safety

 
The maintenance welding of metals involves the generation of temperatures up to thousands
of degrees. It also involves working with electricity, with combustible gases and with a wide
variety of metals, chemicals, fluxes and other potentially hazardous situations, often in
confined spaces.

Yet in the 80 or so years that welding has been regularly practiced, it has been proven
repeatedly that it is a relatively safe occupation which is not injurious to health. However, as
in all trades and all industrial activities, some safety precautions must be taken. Magna
recommends the following be included in your safety program:

(1) Welders should never carry or use butane lighters while welding.

Several fatal accidents have occurred when welders were carrying butane lighters in their
pockets. A spark from a welding arc can penetrate the pocket, land on the lighter, burn
through and thus expose the fluid in the lighter, and an explosion occurs. There is the
same amount of force in a disposable butane lighter when it explodes as there is in
approximately three sticks of dynamite.

(2) Always wear protective clothing suitable for the welding to be done.

(3) Always wear proper eye protection, when welding, grinding or cutting.

(4) Keep your work area clean and free of hazards. Make sure that no flammable, volatile
or explosive materials are in or near the work area.

(5) Handle all compressed gas cylinders with extreme care. Keep caps on when not in
use.

(6) When it is necessary to arc weld in a damp or wet area, wear rubber boots and stand
on a dry insulated platform.

(7) Shield others from the light rays produced by your welding arc.

(8) Do not weld on sealed containers or compartments without providing vents and taking
special precautions.

(9) Do not weld on containers that have held combustibles without taking extra special
precaution.

(10) If it is necessary to splice lengths of welding cable together, make sure all electrical
connections are tight and insulated. Do not use cables with frayed, cracked or bare spots in
the insulation.

(11) Do not weld in a confined space without extra special precautions.

(12) When compressed gas cylinders are empty, close the valve and mark the cylinder
"MT".
 Magna maintenance welding
(13) Do not allow flame cut sparks to hit hoses, regulators or cylinders. Remember
flame cutting sparks can travel 9-12m.

(14) Never use acetylene at a pressure in excess of 1kg per cm2. Higher pressures can
cause an explosion.

(15) Never use oil, grease or any similar material on any apparatus or threaded fittings
in the oxyacetylene or oxy-fuel gas system. Oil and grease in contact with oxygen will
cause spontaneous combustion.

(16) Always use this correct sequence and technique for lighting a torch:

(a) Open acetylene cylinder valve.

(b) Open acetylene torch valve 1/4 turn.
(c) Screw in acetylene regulator, adjusting valve handle to working pressure.
(d) Turn off acetylene torch valve (you will have purged the acetylene line).
(e) Slowly open oxygen cylinder valve all the way.
(f) Open oxygen torch valve 1/4 turn.
(g) Screw in oxygen regulator screw to working pressure.
(h) Turn off oxygen torch valve you will have purged the oxygen line.
(i) Open acetylene torch valve on 1/4 turn and light with a proper lighter. Do not use matches
or cigarette lighters.
(j) Open oxygen torch valve 1/4 turn.
(k) Adjust to proper flame.

(17) Always use this correct sequence and technique of shutting off a torch:

(a) Close acetylene torch valve first, then close oxygen torch valve.
(b) Close cylinder valves, acetylene valve first then close oxygen valve.
(c) Open torch's acetylene and oxygen valves (this will release pressure in the regulator and
hose).
(d) Back off regulator adjusting valve handle until no spring tension is felt.
(e) Close torch valves.

(18) Use adequate ventilation at the point of welding when welding lead, cadmium,
chromium, manganese, brass, bronze, zinc, galvanized steel or other materials that can
produce noxious gases.

(19) Make sure your arc welding equipment is installed properly and grounded and is in
good working condition.

(20) Welding may produce fumes and gases hazardous to health. Avoid breathing these
fumes. Use adequate ventilation.

(21) Nearly all gas welding fluxes and arc welding fluxes are toxic or at least can cause
allergies to certain persons. Do not take welding fluxes internally Maintenance welding safety
and keep out of reach of children.
 Magna maintenance welding

Maintenance welding of steel

 
In maintenance welding there is more steel welded than any other metal. Surveys show
that there are more breakdowns caused by steel weld failures than welds in any other
metal.

Many people believe that steel is easy to weld and so they do not give it much attention.
Often in industry one hears "Oh, it's only mild steel", and so they weld it with any cheap
mild-steel welding rod that is around. This attitude has cost industry more lost
production, more downtime, and more injuries and damaged equipment than most
people are aware of.

No doubt, simple mild steel structures in a production factory are relatively simple to
weld since all or nearly all the variables can be controlled. In maintenance, however, few
of the variables can be controlled. Laboratory conditions simply do not exist in
maintenance welding. There are almost no simple easy maintenance welds to make on
mild steel or any other steel.

There are over 30 different common types of mild steel and semi-mild steel electrodes
now in common usage. They were all designed for production welding. The welder
welds the one application repeatedly so that he becomes highly efficient on the highly
repetitive applications he makes. The ordinary production welding rods are satisfactory
where the variables are controlled.

The same electrodes are also sold by many welding supply marketing companies for
maintenance welding applications for which they were not designed. In maintenance
welding, the conditions are entirely different. The welder does not know the analysis of
the steel he is welding. He cannot control the variables, such as joint design and in
maintenance the steel is often oily, rusty, painted or dirty.

Production welding steel electrodes have been designed for an exceedingly limited
range of applications - usually only one per type.

In a production plant the variety of steel welding is limited. For example, they may weld
only one type of structure - hot water tanks. These usually consist of only one type of
joint such as a butt joint. They probably use a positioner so the welding is all performed
flat (downhand). The analysis of the clean new steel is known and they probably have
elaborate jigs and fixtures for perfect alignment so distortion and warpage are not
problems either. They have selected an easy-to-weld steel base metal to make the
tanks from.

The maintenance welder, however, is faced with a completely different set of

circumstances which require a welding electrode designed for the different conditions he
is confronted with:

(1) The maintenance mechanic more often than not, does not work full time as a welder.
In most industries welding is only one of his important jobs. He attends to mechanical
repairs, electrical repairs, machine rebuilding, plumbing, truck repair, etc. Since he
doesn't work exclusively as a welder, often he understandably cannot develop maximum
welding skill.
 Magna maintenance welding
(2) The maintenance welder does not do the same welding project repeatedly as the
production welder does. Every job is different. In general the maintenance welder does
not have a large volume of one type of welding, but has an infinite variety of
applications. If he relies on production welding rods he has to have possible as many as
30 different types of steel electrodes.

(3) The maintenance welder often has to weld steel in confined areas of poor access to
the fracture awaiting repair.

(4) Maintenance welding of steel is much more difficult than production welding. In
production, the engineers and designers select an easy-to-weld steel. The maintenance
welder is often called upon to weld "unweldable" steels, eg, a pump shaft or electric
motor shaft. When the equipment was manufactured there was no welding performed on
the shaft, thus the engineers or designers most likely selected a free-machining steel
which could be machined at low cost.

Such a steel is considered unweldable. Nevertheless, the maintenance welder has to

weld it. And when he does he should always use Magna Maintenance Welding
Electrodes, as these have been specially designed for the wide variety of complex
welding the maintenance department has to do.

(5) The maintenance welder often has to weld "poor-fit" applications, thick-to-thin, and
difficult metals such as alloy steel, galvanized iron, high carbon steel, crack sensitive
steel, and steel of unknown analysis.

Steels that were "simple mild steel" when in a production factory, and thus not difficult to
weld, become highly crack sensitive when later maintenance welding has to be done on
them. This is because they are painted, have grease crayon marks, carbon smudges
from a cutting torch, or oil and grease on them. All of these materials are carbonaceous.
When welding a piece of mild steel that has oil or other carbonaceous material on it, the
maintenance welder is actually welding high carbon steel.

All of these carbonaceous materials inherent on steel in maintenance conditions, go into

the weld as carbon and cause the weld and weld area to become high carbon steels.
Every engineer knows that a high carbon steel weld is highly crack sensitive.

(6) Maintenance welding has to be of a higher quality standard than production welding.
In production welding, it is customary for an inspector to follow the production welder
and locate any weld flaws - usually about 3-6%.

In maintenance, the welder is allowed zero defects. He usually has one broken part to
repair and he must weld it right the first time or else a great deal of costly downtime or
possibly injury to his fellow workers will occur when the weld fails in service.

(7) The maintenance welder often has to weld equipment which is old and the original
design was not intended for today's higher-speed, higher-powered requirements. Thus
the welds must be of greater toughness and greater strength in maintenance than in
production. Plus the fact that the maintenance industry has to cope with machinery that
was poorly designed and needs to be "beefed up" and reinforced with higher strength
welds. The higher strength Magna Maintenance Welding Electrodes are often the only
solution.

(8) In a production factory they often weld a part and then stress-relieve or heat-treat
 Magna maintenance welding
after welding. However, when this part breaks down and has to be repair welded in the
field, it has to be repaired without dismantling and it is impossible for stress relief after
welding. When Magna Maintenance Welding Electrodes are used, problems such as
these are simplified.

The maintenance welding solution

Magna has reduced the complexity of steel welding in maintenance to where it is no

longer a cause of anxiety. In literally hundreds of thousands of industries all over the
world they have discontinued using production welding rods for steel maintenance and
now use only genuine Magna Maintenance Welding Electrodes and Alloys.

Magna products are believed to be the only welding electrodes and filler metals in the
world which are designed, produced, sold, and serviced internationally, solely for
maintenance. All the other products are manufactured for production.

Magna Electrodes and Alloy Filler Metals are better for maintenance in several
important and completely exclusive ways:

(1) Magna products have greater versatility built into them. Each product gives optimum
performance on a wide range of different joint designs, different base-metal types and
different conditions.

(2) Magna products have extra-high physical properties including higher tensile
strength, higher yield strength, higher elongation and greater holding power. This gives
the welder an edge. The greater strength tends to compensate for any flaws in the weld
due to inaccessibility, poor position, unknown composition, and conditions that are not
ideal, as well as difficult-to-weld metals.

(3) Magna Alloys and Electrodes are easier to apply. Even unskilled welders can
accomplish difficult jobs. Even more importantly, highly skilled welders can achieve
extraordinary results with a combination of their skill and Magna's ease of application.

Magna supplies five electrodes for steel welding:MAGNA 303 AC-DC. This one
electrode welds all steels and it is the only electrode a small maintenance department
needs to stock.

 MAGNA 305 AC-DC. This electrode welds all low alloy steels and mild steels. It
is widely used for fabricating the new high strength construction steels in the
maintenance department.
 MAGNA 307 AC-DC. Is an alloy steel electrode for all mild and miscellaneous
steels.
 MAGNA 393 AC-DC. An electrode for stainless that provides improved corrosion
resistance and that runs off even small AC "buzz-box" welding machines
satisfactorily.

 Magna 395 AC-DC. Designed to tackle the repair of duplex stainless steels.
 Magna maintenance welding
 
How Magna alloys are designed for maintenance
 
It happens frequently that electrode users analyze the core wire of an electrode to predict or
consider the weld metal composition. This procedure falls down completely. The analysis of the core
wire of an electrode is by no means the same as the deposit chemistry.

Many people presume that if they are welding a specific base metal, they will have an identical and
satisfactory weld if they use an electrode having a core wire of the same composition as the base
metal. As an example, they presume that by welding a base metal of Type SAE 4130 (chrome moly
steel) with an electrode with a Type SAE 4130 steel core wire, the weld deposit will match exactly
the base metal and the weld will perform identically to the base metal.

This is an understandable, but completely illogical conclusion for many reasons. Following are a few
examples:

(1) The base metal is usually a hot or cold worked material, having had grain refinement from the
working (such as rolling). The weld metal is a cast material and thus cannot exactly resemble the
base metal if the analysis is the same, unless the electrode has additional properties to compensate
for this vast difference.

(2) Weld metals are prone to pore-formation, which will also make a weld deposit differ from a base
metal even if the analysis of the core wire is identical.

(3) Some ingredients of the core wire, such as chromium, are invariably lost in gaseous form into the
atmosphere during the arc transfer.

(4) Ordinary welds are prone to contamination from many sources including:

(a) Carbon, phosphorous, and sulphur content of the electrode or the base metal fused into the
weld deposit, which often cause interdentric cracking in the weld deposit. These
contaminants, and many others, segregate following solidification of the weld metal and
follow the primary grain boundaries causing hot-cracks. Phosphorous also causes welds to
be brittle at low temperature.
(b) Ordinary weld deposits are quite susceptible to oxygen contamination. Oxygen in solid
solution reduces the impact toughness and tensile strength of steel. Welds made with other
electrodes than Magna generally contain more oxygen than do ordinary steel base metals.

(c) Nitrogen absorption of welds made with ordinary electrodes is a matter of serious concern.
Nitrogen in solid solution absorbed from the atmosphere during welding lowers the impact
toughness of welds, lowers the elongation, and is generally responsible for "ageing", which
is a precipitate process in welds which causes impact toughness and ductility to deteriorate
to very low values. When one considers that 78% of the air is nitrogen and that nitrogen
causes welds to be brittle, the need for prevention of nitrogen contamination becomes
obvious.

Magna has recognized that a series of problems result from the old idea of presuming that the same
type core wire as base metal is adequate and will supply good results for maintenance applications.

Magna research has proven that in virtually any maintenance weldment, the electrodes must have
much higher alloy content and much higher physical properties than the base metal.
 Magna maintenance welding

Magna solutions
An electrode consists of two parts: a core wire and a coating. Magna uses high-purity core wire
having generally a much higher content of noble or semi-noble metals (such as nickel, molybdenum,
columbium, cobalt, silicon, manganese, vanadium, chromium, and other "super-metals") than
ordinary electrodes.

The highly researched super high alloy Magna core wires with extra high alloy content, stabilizing
agents, highly deoxidized metals, and high purity metals and other improvements completely change
the character of the arc. The core wires of Magna Maintenance Welding Electrodes are carefully
controlled so that metals or elements that - in excess - can cause difficulty or possible weld failure,
such as carbon, sulphur, or phosphorous, are either refined out or held in exceedingly low amounts.
This enables them to be stabilized by special additives which Magna incorporates in the formulation
of the electrode. Nothing has been left to chance.

Magna conducts continuous extensive research in electrode coating chemistry and electrode
coating technology. Magna employs leading scientists and many highly qualified chemists and
technicians who perform studies in electrode coating technology. Among the reasons for Magna
Maintenance Welding superiority is the advanced state of Magna' s Maintenance Electrode coating
technology. It is believed that the coatings of Magna electrodes are the most advanced in the world
with respect to maintenance applications. Magna electrode coatings contribute to maintenance weld
quality in many special ways, including:

 Magna's unique coatings deoxidize the weld metal. Oxygen contamination is a major cause
of weld failure. Magna electrodes contain special deoxidizers which completely remove
most oxygen and reduce the balance to exceedingly finely dispersed inclusions. The
deoxidizer system is of a proprietary and special nature not universally available.

 Magna coatings actually produce a super shielding gas to protect the molten weld metal.
This gas envelope produced by the melting of the coatings is especially designed to prevent
the weld from being contaminated by nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen and other harmful
elements that often cause failure in ordinary electrode deposits.

 Pore-resistant coatings. Magna electrode coatings contain scavengers, cleansers,

degreasers, and have an ability to absorb foreign matter, dirt, contamination, and impurities,
float them away, and hold them in the slag for easy removal. This special feature enables
Magna maintenance welds to be made without the porosity that is common with ordinary
electrodes.

 Magna Maintenance Electrodes provide a slag layer around the molten metal globules
during transfer, and then form a protective chemical slag blanket over the complete weld
deposit. With most electrodes, the slag is usually little more than a residue of the electric
welding process. Magna Maintenance Electrodes have a completely different type coating
which forms a protective blanket that not only provides a resistance to oxidation and other
contamination but emphatically retards the cooling rate. A "Widmanstatten" structure occurs
when ordinary electrodes are used which allow the weld to cool too rapidly. The
Widmansttten structure caused by rapid cooling with ordinary production electrodes is
harmful. Rapid cooling causes the ferrite to form needle-like plates which are transverse to
the pearlite.

The Magna slag blanket holds the heat and retards the cooling to permit the complete precipitation
of the ferrite in the grain boundaries in such a way that the ferrite surrounds the pearlite grains. The
Magna protective slag blanket effectively retards the cooling rate and promotes a more refined and
 Magna maintenance welding
more desirable grain structure.

 Hydrogen gas inclusion (commonly referred to as "fish-eyes") is a major problem in

maintenance welding. Hydrogen's main threat to welding comes from the chemically
combined water which is present in the coatings of many production welding electrodes.
This water decomposes into hydrogen and oxygen in the arc transfer process. Iron has a
high solubility for hydrogen even at moderate temperatures, so considerable amounts of
hydrogen enter weld deposits.
 The hydrogen which enters the weld when production welding electrodes are used can be
completely removed by heating the weld to 482 oF (250 oC) and holding the part at this heat
for 15 hours.

This procedure can be carried out in production factories as another step in manufacture. However,
it is totally impractical in maintenance welding. This is why the Magna Research Department has
given consideration to the problem of hydrogen inclusion in maintenance welds.

It has repeatedly been demonstrated that hydrogen contamination of welds cause cracking and
underbead cracking (this is a type of cracking in the heat affected zone adjacent to or under the
weld, caused by the hydrogen contamination during welding). Hydrogenous welds cause a
pronounced reduction in ductility and elongation and are crack sensitive.

Magna has built into the special coatings a resistance to hydrogen transfer across the arc.
Electrodes such as Magna 305, Magna 303 and many others are based on all mineral coatings with
special additives that tend to repel hydrogen. These coatings, in manufacture, are baked at high
temperatures to remove even the last traces of hydrogen. These special coatings are another
reason Magna electrodes result in more reliable maintenance welds.

Magna coatings are not mere simple cellulose or rutile formulations. They contain many
supplements and special features. Some of these are:

(1) Higher purity, higher quality binders.

(2) Higher purity, higher quality chemicals. There are many grades of chemicals available to
electrode manufacturers including the lower quality technical grades, U.S. pure, Pharmaceutical
grades, etc. Magna quality requires unusually high grades of chemicals.

(3) Magna coatings are produced with special mixing equipment, using a variety of mixers to attain
different results with different chemicals. The particle size of chemicals is carefully studied. The
mixing of the coatings is carefully monitored so that every batch is identical.

(4) Magna introduces many additional metals such as strontium, sodium, aluminium, graphite, as
well as stabilizing compounds and various other additives such as fluorides, carbonates and
calcium, through the unique coatings to improve both maintenance weld quality and weldability.

(5) Magna upgrades the quality of the deposit by adding finely ground metal to the coating. Such
metals as molybdenum, chromium, cobalt, nickel and many others enrich the weld deposit.

(6) The concentricity of all Magna Maintenance Welding Electrodes is controlled with such surgical
preciseness that the maximum core-plus-one-covering dimension by more than 5 per cent of the
minimum core-plus-one-covering dimension. This precise concentricity control prevents "finger-
nailing", uneven burn-off, erratic performance and spatter which occurs with so many welding
electrodes because of poor concentricity.

(7) Magna employs carefully controlled amounts of ferrite formers in the coatings in order to enable
the Magna deposits to resist hot-cracking. Magna electrode coatings are highly sophisticated
coatings, many containing more than 20 ingredients. They are the result of specific research to
design coatings especially engineered for the special problems of maintenance welding. It is
 Magna maintenance welding
believed that they represent the highest state of the art today for the purpose for which they have
been designed. They supply weld deposit additions that provide increased physical properties and
increased resistance to cracking or costly weld failures. The coatings are so rich in extra metals and
supplements that the final alloying process is actually only completely finished at the tip of the
electrode.
 Magna maintenance welding
Magna fluxes
 
Nearly all Magna oxyacetylene welding, brazing and soldering alloys require the use of a companion
Magna Welding Flux.

Each Magna Flux is calibrated to provide optimum performance with the Magna Welding Alloy it
was designed to be used with. The numbering system used makes it easy to know which Magna
Flux to use with a specific Magna Alloy. All the Alloys in the Magna maintenance range that require
a flux are of two digits (all Magna maintenance welding electrodes are 3 digits). The Flux is
packaged in unbreakable plastic jars.

Some of the Magna Maintenance Alloys for torch application have the flux coated on the filler rod. In
this case the letter 'F' is added to the two digits. Examples are Magna 33F and Magna 75F.
However, extra flux is available in standard non-breakable plastic jars because on some applications
extra flux is required. For example, when flowing an alloy through an exceptionally long lap joint, or
when welding exceptionally dirty metal, extra flux is helpful.

Magna Fluxes are quite different from ordinary production type Fluxes. The purpose they serve is
immensely important to the job at hand and they are not related to the ordinary borax, water and dye
that make up a large percentage of what is currently being sold as - flux. They are the result of many
years of scientific research.

Here are four good reasons for using Magna Fluxes:

(1) Magna Maintenance Engineered Fluxes have built-in 'Super Energy'. Every liquid (and molten
weld-metal is no exception) has a force known as surface-tension. Surface tension is the result of
the liquid making an effort to minimize its surface and to satisfy the requirements of the lowest state
of energy.

Molten metal has a tendency to draw itself into the shape of a sphere, globule or droplet, and this
shape (in welding terms) has the smallest surface of any geometric configuration - with an equal
volume.

Substantial energy is required to change the geometric dimensions of the weld deposit. Especially
so since it must be done instantly, because the molten weld-metal freezes very rapidly.

Through scientific research Magna Fluxes have been engineered to provide the super energy
necessary to alter the geometric dimensions, break the surface tension and spread the molten weld-
metal with incomparable force.

NOTE: When the weld metal has a high contact angle (as in the case of a sphere which often results
with ordinary fluxes), very little strength is provided.

(2) Magna Fluxes have a powerful dissolving effect that promotes a point of total, thermodynamic
equilibrium. This is achieved through special chemical reactions. This takes place deep within the
metal surface. The process is one of actually penetrating into the metal pores and surface
irregularities in order to prepare an area of tenacious anchorage.

(2) Magna Fluxes cleanse the base metal. Every welder knows that metal contains impurities
deep inside the metal surface. The impurities are one of the main causes of poor bonding.
Magna Fluxes actually penetrate the metal surface, follow the metal geography and perform
powerful de-oxidizing and scavenging operations. Then, by depressing the melting point of
these oxides, they are floated or vaporised, leaving behind a sterile, clean metal 'comb' into
which the molten weld-metal will traverse and bond.
 Magna maintenance welding

(4) Magna Fluxes contain micro-pulverized metals such as Barium, Magnesium, Strontium, Boron,
Zinc, Tin, Molybdenum, Lithium, Chromium, Tellurium, Sodium and Misch-metal. Their super-
micronized sizes give them the ability to become liquid and bond, with very little heat, ensuring that
they form an affinity with the inner-pores of the metal surface. This affinity results in a surface
alloying effect which results in an incredibly super-strong bond which is anchored 'inside' the metal
surface.

All Magna Fluxes meet or exceed the United States Government quality control specification MIL-Q-
9858A.