Sumtin' ain't right

[Kent]

I am a novice in the purest form with it comes to pulling dents. I bought the stinger from Len a long time ago. I now have a chance to use it.

I took a piece of a hood I had laying around and took a hammer to it and made a moderate dent. I ground it down to metal and commenced welding studs. That was the fun part. The studs that held the best were the ones that BURNED A HOLE CLEAR THROUGH THE METAL! Now from my little knowledge, that is not supposed to happen.

I really don't think that I held that tip on for more than 1second. The area around these studs looked like a perfect burned area. Any ideas on what I may be doing wrong? If I can't get this figured out I am going to pass on the job.

And, how do you keep a door panel from bursting into flames with this thing? I was amazed at how hot that thing got.

[Bob K]

A second is way to long. Do some more tests triggering the gun. The trick is to get the weakest stud weld that will let you pull the dent. I say that because pulling the dent is only half the problem. You also have to remove the stud. If it is just barley gripping the steel it is easy to remove by clamping onto the head with a vise grip and giving it a twist. Ideally there will be only a small mark that can be remover with a 36 Rol-lokc disc on your die grinder. A stud put on this way will break off if you bend it around too much so be a little careful putting your gripper on. The T handle hand grip gives the best results on small dents. The slide hammer will let you pull harder than you should and put a high spot in the metal which is almost as bad as the dent.

I lightly sand the nose of the stud gun after 20 or 30 studs. You want good contact between the nose and the panel because this completes the circuit for the weld. If the nose is dirty it will make a poor stud weld and excessive trigger time to get a stud to stick.

Bob K

[Bob K]

One other thing I forgot to mention. A very short trigger pull will also help with fire prevention. You must be aware that there may be something behind the panel that you can’t see that may catch on fire. Also be aware that if the paint on the back side gets damaged there will be a place for rust to start. The minimal weld will just barely scorch the paint on the back side, just a darkening, not complete destruction.

By short trigger pull I mean trigger in and out as fast as possible with no dwell time. Start there and add as small amount of time as you can get away with until you are happy with the studs.

Bob K

[lethal-6]

Try another piece of metal. you mention what you used was a piece of hood, If it is from a ford truck it could be aluminum thats what happen to me I didn't know. I hope this helps.

[Kent]

It's steel. I guess I just need to be a little faster on the trigger. I have a lot of scrap around so maybe tomorrow I will practice welding.

[Phil V]

Kent, I've never had a stud burn a hole through the metal. Next time grind the paint off down to clean metal before you start hammering it with a hammer. The only time a spot welder (and that gun IS a spot welder) will blow a hole in metal is if the weld area is contaminated with paint or rust causing the welder to not get a good electrical contact point.