Tig or Mig

[Pahs59]

Has anyone used both?
I have been using a mig replacing inner and outer sills and new floor pans now is time to start rust repairs on a few panels mainly bottoms of guards and headlight peaks..a couple doors need a few patches in outer skins in the corners.
Has anyone used a Tig on outer panels

[59wagon]

Hi mate, I use both, and I’m NOT a qualified or very competent welder but been doing a lot of practicing.
In my limited experience, tig is nicer for panel work and quite a bit faster. I find it nicer because there’s hardly any grinding/sanding, if at all, especially if you fusion weld (no filler). As the weld is relatively soft compared to Mig, it’s very easy to hammer and dolly straight after welding. Even with using filler wire, there’s still less grinding needed than Mig and it’s still soft for hammer and dolly work.
I find it faster than Mig because you can do a continuous fusion weld with little distortion, compared to Mig where the common way is to “spot” weld at different locations - the biggest time saver though is in the required grinding, and depending on how aggressive you are, the grinding introduces more heat, so more distortion.
Nothing wrong with Mig though, I love my Mig and use it for most other jobs, but I’m now lucky enough to have a choice. Prior to the tig, I liked using oxy acetylene for panel work, with and without filler rod - it’s nice and quiet and similar to tig in that you can continuous weld, it’s easy to hammer and dolly because it’s also soft, and no angle grinding. With the tig and oxy, I use sanding discs on roloc attachments on an air tool to knock back any highs after hammer and dolly work, followed by a body file.
Cheers, John


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[waynos]

i love this question
they both work.they heat metal and fuse them together
i cant be botheredd to type the long answer,
so heres my short answer
many people mig then grind the weld off.the mig weld is harder than the parent metal.
they grind,grind,grind,till its smooth,not realising there is no parent metal left until its like paper.
more in part 2 after more peoples opinions haha

[waynos]

so without being a smart arse they both work
use what you have to get the job done
if you are to buy a tig get one with hf high frequency cause the scratch start fucks your tungsten leading to wavey arc all over the place
definitely you will get a better panel with tig but if you dnt know how to use it properly you will do it better with mig
you can buy a unimig razor tig for 600 bucks which is as good as my 4500 kemmpi at work
then ya need to buy argon bottle for 450 so its a 1000 buck outlay when you can do the job with the mig you already have
am i contradicting myself?
yes 
if ya rich go buy a tig
if ya not keep migging and buy some other parts for your car
Thats my 2 bob
 

[waynos]

i dont have a mig at home by the way but i can borrow one from work if i need to but only ever feel the need when doing plugwelds,so i just do them with the tig anyway

[Pahs59]

That’s what I was told about tig on outer panels that the weld is not as hard like a mig and less distortion I ended up getting one..a tig plasma cutter and stick all in one from Edison’s Pretty cheap they had a sale on while the COVID thing was happening.Went to Bunnings got a bottle of argon $200 deposit for bottle $100 for gas refill and have been playing around on old scrap door skins and find it’s not much different to oxy welding, I guess it’s still only just a heat source and filler wire but noticed everything has to be spotless clean so anyway I’m having a bit of fun on the old throw away panels but that may change when I get onto my keeper panels..thanks 59wagon and Waynos