Spot welding using Stick (or TIG) welder

[rashid11]

Assuming one has a stick or TIG welder, can these be adopted to do spot welding ?

Am thinking about using this to spot weld bolsters, typically 1/8-1/4 thick pieces of 416 stainless to 440C/154CM/ATS-34 "knife steels".

Is it as simple as fashioning some kind of copper tongs setup ?

I am OK with some damage to the "exterior" of the bolsters as I can always grind it off. What does a typical weld timing/current settings look like ?

 

[deker]

Rashid,

You may just want to keep an eye out for the Harbor Freight spot welders to go on sale. It'll likely be less of a pain, and probably more safe than a rigged up setup. They usually come down to ~$100 on sale.

-d

 

[mete]

Are you trying to weld a guard to a blade ? Is the blade already hardened ? Welding will give you a thin zone of untempered martensite which would be best tempered at least 400 F.

 

[Deweyknives]

A small 'handyman' grade spotwelder will not weld THRU 1/8" stainless and a knife blank. Those are made for sheet metal, and marginaly effective on that.

The only way I can see to spotweld bolsters [one on each side] would be to drill thru the bolster and plug-weld it to the blade.

 

[Bill Burke]

you can use a tig welder to weld the bolsters on just chamfer them and weld around them on the top bottom and front then grind clean and heat treat. many of the Japanese kitchen cutlery are done this way.

 

[rashid11]

I read somewhere about a KM using spot welders for bolsters - with folding knifes in that particular case. Uber quick and very clean - that's what attracted me in this particular method.

I am not trying to rig one out of microwave trans or anything, would instead use an existing stick welder, would only need the contact tongs made. I know of HF's welder - it is a $199 item and as long as I can re-use what I already have, I'd rather save the $.