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What have you bought firearms related in the last 48 hours?

Bassbob said:
I just looked, the big one is a 200. I have about 4 tanks of Argon. My dad and my wife's dad were both welders and had several tanks.
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i have a miller bobcat 225 and use a suitcase type for the wire and rarely use it welder as a rod use. i'm terrible with it. wire welding is a lazy job just for me. to bad plasma has limits on reach. doesn't bother me that much as i'm not needing anymore than 25'
 
TEXASforLIFE said:
i have a miller bobcat 225 and use a suitcase type for the wire and rarely use it welder as a rod use. i'm terrible with it. wire welding is a lazy job just for me. to bad plasma has limits on reach. doesn't bother me that much as i'm not needing anymore than 25'
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My old man used to have a similar Miller portable. Not sure of the exact model. He sold it off several years ago.

I've also got a big ass Lincoln tig/stick machine. I don't mind stick welding and it's definitely better for some more critical things. I have no clue how to tig weld. Yet. But I will.
 
Bassbob said:
My old man used to have a similar Miller portable. Not sure of the exact model. He sold it off several years ago.

I've also got a big ass Lincoln tig/stick machine. I don't mind stick welding and it's definitely better for some more critical things. I have no clue how to tig weld. Yet. But I will.
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i've tried tig and this is what i found out about my skills..............................i can melt aluminum very good! going thru auto mechanics we had a related class of welding in engine rebuildings. 2 or 3 times a week we'd go and learn starting with stick. different rod sizes and thicknesses of metal and welding different angles. if you passes stick then you go to mig and if passed that you go to tig. never thought i'd get out of stick and mig (at the time there wasn't any flux wire) and i and another guy were the only 2 (in our class) to try tig. neither of us could do it. he faired better in tig that i did. stick welding is 1 thing i didn't inherent from my dad along with roping. my brother on the other hand could do both.
 
TEXASforLIFE said:
i've tried tig and this is what i found out about my skills..............................i can melt aluminum very good! going thru auto mechanics we had a related class of welding in engine rebuildings. 2 or 3 times a week we'd go and learn starting with stick. different rod sizes and thicknesses of metal and welding different angles. if you passes stick then you go to mig and if passed that you go to tig. never thought i'd get out of stick and mig (at the time there wasn't any flux wire) and i and another guy were the only 2 (in our class) to try tig. neither of us could do it. he faired better in tig that i did. stick welding is 1 thing i didn't inherent from my dad along with roping. my brother on the other hand could do both.
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I never took any welding classes. But then neither did my father in law and he was one of the best welders around. Tig included. Not that I am that great of a welder but I can get the job done.
 
Bassbob said:
I never took any welding classes. But then neither did my father in law and he was one of the best welders around. Tig included. Not that I am that great of a welder but I can get the job done.
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i can only hope that any of my kids can stick weld. i wouldn't be a good teacher of stick! i can't blame any of those who tried too teach me on stick for my out coming, it was me and me alone as i'm not well suited for it. i usually burn up half a rod before i get a decent weld. i tried cutting 1 in half for kicks and nope it didn't help:cry:
 
At about 10-12 years old I walked to/from school. On the way was an old country gent who had a back yard welding shop, basically nothing more than a pole barn with a poorly poured concrete floor. Probably 1500-1600sq'. Each afternoon as I'd pass his shop I'd stop in and talk with the old man telling him how much interest I had in learning to weld. At some point he told me if I'd do a little sweeping and clean-up in the afternoons, he's teach me to weld. Believe it or not this was in the days when a situation like that was set up by him actually calling my parents to ensure his offer was OK by them. All agreed so I started my welding career in about 1955-56.

Some of my first experiences was simply this: I'd do a little clean-up then he'd give me a hand full of scrap metal and a hand full of bottom wire cut outs from wire clothes hangers, or some 10" pieces of 3/32" baling wire. Yep, not real welding rods, but what the hell did I know. It never occurred to me the rods he was giving me had no flux. I practiced, practiced, and practiced with those stupid wires and an old buzz box for literally months till I actually could get some reasonably decent welds. Most of them short welds, but decent. Just as I was about to lose all hope of ever learning to weld, he sat me down and told what he had done and why. His belief was that if I could learn to be steady enough and disciplined enough to actually weld with a bare bones rod and no flux, I'd eventually be able to weld just about anything. After that he provided me with good rods and materials, looked over my shoulder a lot, and guided me to become a very competent welder. I took those country pole barn lessons on and off till sometime in the early 60's. I still think of that old man often.

Now the rest of the story: I got my first ASTM certification at 21 years old, the same year I was discharged from service. Then at about 23 I was AWS certified, and those two best I can remember qualified me to weld on most anything from sky scrapers to suspension bridges. Then somewhere around 25 was certified to weld on boilers and pressure vessels. This was all back in the early 70's so I don't remember all the positions, ranges, or much else to be honest. All those certifications did me little good. But all that practice with bare clothes hanger wire stayed with me all those years. There wasn't much I couldn't do with any kind of welding machine.

At one point in my working career I actually worked as a boiler maker for about 2 1/2 years. Mostly welding tube ends to the sheets after they were rolled, and/or welding leaking 'stay-bolts'. Other than that never welded as a career. Career was everything from shoe salesman to District Director of Operations and Maintenance of a local public school system.

Did a lot of welding in my own little shops on and off over time (60+/- yrs), and did a lot of side jobs. Always had the equipment. I've built many air boats, stock cars, trailers of all kinds, cut out and welded many, many sets of steel silhouettes for the Hunter Pistol and Rifle silhouette competitions back in the 80's and 90's, many thousands of dollars of ornamental iron art/projects and was neighborhood repairman in every neighborhood we lived in for more than 50+/- years. Even now that we've sold out and moved into a retirement asylum (;)) community, I've helped set up a small (about 1000sq' resident work shop with about 1/3 of the floor space dedicated to metal working, primarily welding.

I've set up some basic equipment, like oxy/ace torch, a small flux core wire feed Hobart, a small (140A) Lincoln mig, a 190amp Hobart mig, 100amp spool gun for aluminum, a 225amp Lincoln buzz box, a small metal roller, tubing notcher, a 40" 16ga sheet metal brake, several grinders, both stand mounted and right angle hand grinders, drill bit sharpener, and a few other assorted tools. I not only help some of the folks around here do little projects/repairs, but also provide lessons to help those who want to learn to weld. On occasion I've even been called on to make a small repair of sorts here at the asylum. I truly love the art/skill of welding, always have, and it appears I'll be doing to the end.
 
As far as what have I bought regarding guns ... only a little gun oil (CLP) and a few patches. But I do have another issue to share. About a year ago I mentioned here on this thread that I had just bought my 'better half' a brand new S&W Equalizer 9mm. It was a little bigger than she wanted, but the first 9mm we had found that she could reliably rack to load. Well, first couple trips to the range she loved it. It shot well, was easy enough for her to load/rack and reload/rack. However on about our 3rd-4th trip, it failed to reset the trigger a couple times. I thought what the heck, maybe I didn't clean it well enough after the last trip. Manually re-racking it several times it would reset. Got back home and really cleaned it well, made sure it was clean and lubed. Back to the range and again it failed to reset after a few rounds. Several manual racks and it reset again. We did that maybe 5-6 times that day. I knew it wasn't due to not being clean, so I laid it to being a new gun. Long story short, had the same issue several times over the next few range trips trying to determine if it would clear up after a few hundred/thousand rounds.

It never got any better so I contacted S&W customer service. Couldn't have had any better service. They were courteous, professional, and damned quick. Created a return mailing label on the spot, emailed it to me in a few minutes after just a few questions. I got it boxed up per their instructions that afternoon and off to the nearest Fed Ex the next day. No issues whatever at Fed Ex. He placed a little label of some kind on it and gave me a receipt and a tracking #. Told me it would be at S&W on Tuesday since Monday (today) was Memorial day. During conversation with CS at S&W I asked if they had any idea how long it might be. The lady said they had no way of knowing until they can see and handle the gun, but that turn arounds had been running pretty reasonably lately.

Then I started researching and have now seen several reports of issues of that gun not resetting over the past few months. So my guess is that there is an issue with the gun and they're on to it now. Turn around should be pretty quick I'm thinking. Anybody here know anything more about the issue?
 
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