I'm looking for some pointers from any DIY (or pro) welders please?

There are three welding courses being held at my local college and I'm unsure which I should attend. I'm looking at training up to be able to do some welding on my own van (which probably means some chassis and bodywork)

The three courses are:

Tungsten Inert Gas Welding Award Level 1

Metal Inert Gas Welding Award Level 1

Manual Metal Arc Welding Award Level 1

Any advice about which would serve me best?

Thanks in advance.

MIG is the one you will be using at home. So choose the 2nd course.

TIG welding is mainly used in fabrication/aluminium/ and takes a lot of practise. This is the one which gives the lovely fish scale welding as seen on bike frames etc


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I did the City & Guilds Level 1 MIG course at my local college and it was a total waste of money. They might as well have named the course 'teach yourself to weld'. That may just be a reflection on the college/course I attended, but if you're starting from scratch with no prior experience, you need a little support and practical tutoring to learn and that was conspicuously absent.

With hindsight, I wish I'd just bought a decent hobby welder for the same price as the course and some scrap steel and taught myself at home. I'd have learned as much, if not more, with the help of a bunch of YouTube videos and a forum like Mig Welding

As it is, I'm >£300 down and don't own a welder.

We spent most of Saturday (just gone) at the technical weekend at Viccy Farm playing with MIG welders

Advice from Alan Schofield, Steve and Alec was to go for a MIG welder.

Great to be pointed in the right direction, but the advice was to get a load of scrap and practice

I taught myself to mig weld. Read up and buy one that has enough control for current etc but not too complicated.

The only advice I was given was listen for the sizzle


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Hi goose, G here, my eldest son James ( who you know) is a DT teacher and when he joined a new school he inherited a Mig welder, wire and gas.. and a Pedrozolli cut off saw...

He asked me for advice...( I used to work in the details and Body side)...I learned to gas weld first and braze and plasma cutting... LOL
My advice was there are only a few variables to play with.. to control the welder.. feed speed/ current/ gas etc..

as above ^^^^^^^^^^
Maybe first watch you tube and get some scrap and try it out..
Make sure your gas does not run out or the wire is not rusty... or the feed wheel is not worn..

Get the safety gear and do not look at the arc... you'll get arc eye and a very sore eye.. Just make sure you have all the safety kit..

James built a Locost kit car from scratch as a school project..
Once he had mastered MiG he bought a Chinese Tig set and made inlet manifolds/ exhaust set up out of stainless...

Ive been trying to improve my Tig welding recently and stumbled across these pages, its quite good overall, some useful info and all in video form so you can do it at your own speed.

http://welding-tv.com/category/mig-welding/

Thanks everyone some valuable information there! I think I'll sack the course off and put the money towards a welder instead

Wow Graham, James is quite the talent. I don't think I'll ever be at that level but every little helps! Thanks for the info.

I did a few courses in my college 5 years after I started welding my own cars. Level 1 city and guilds is all based on 3mm steel and level 2 was all based on 10mm steel. It 100% made me a better welder when it comes to fabrication work but there was no information that helped with vehicle repair.
Body work is 0.9mm, structure (sills pillars etc) can get up to 1.2mm and chassis (on vws) is 2mm. On these thicknesses (especially 0.9) you can not run a seam of weld. You must build the weld up with evenly spaced tacks to avoid heat build up which will lead to distortion and holes. When welding 3mm you can just run the welder on a mid power setting (depending on power of welder) start at one end and run to the other.
If you want a welding qualification then go to college. If you want to patch your sill then have a go yourself, watch some YouTube videos, chat with friends/family/neighbours who weld, if you want to tackle your own restoration and want to do a good job of it then research panel beating/vehicle restoration classes, I think Leeds college do a few weekend course's. They are usually at the practical classics restoration show in Birmingham NEC if you want to speak to them and get an idea of courses available, cost etc.
I hope this helps, never be embarrassed or scared to ask questions if you ever get stuck, we all started at the bottom and worked things out as we went along. Better you ask and learn from someone else's mistake than ruin what your working on!

...like tack and then work backwards to infill, short stretches at a time...

Great info thanks!

I was wondering whether one welder could do both bodywork and chassis 55bdkombi, good to know it can. Your right panel beating would be very useful too, I did a bit at college but that was 20 odd years ago!